


Chill or Be Chilled

by TotalSkeletonTrash



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Eventual Smut, F/F, F/M, Frisk Uses Sign Language, I Don't Even Know, M/M, Oh, Penguins, Reader Is Not Frisk, Reader has female parts, Slow Burn, dongs4sure, go to hell with me, gross love stuff, in retrospect this wasn't that slow of a burn, it's like ridiculously long and look at all these kudos and comments, just go for it, reader identifies as female, some sci fi shit, they can't all be wrong, total fiasco, u love skelz, um, wretched disaster you, you beautiful soul, you brave
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-09
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2018-05-05 19:32:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 175
Words: 478,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5387672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TotalSkeletonTrash/pseuds/TotalSkeletonTrash
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been about a year since the barrier fell, and a lot has changed - though not in very surprising ways. People are still jerks to anyone new and different, you're still freaked out by the idea of getting serious with anyone, your job is still weird and awesome. Oh, and your cat still has seriously no chill.<br/>Also there is skeleton dong and small corporate politics.<br/>"But it's too long!" You say. That's exactly the sort of attitude that stops me from making boxed mac and cheez when EasyMac's right there. Don't be like me. If you're going to indulge in trash, commit to it, man. <br/>I mean also eventually the plotting gets so tight you could bounce a quarter off it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>  <strong>Book One: Skarmageddon --- Chapters 1 - 92</strong><br/><strong>Book Two: Even Skarmier ---  Chapters 93 - 170</strong><br/><strong>Epilogue shit --- 171 to like, whatever </strong></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which Your Cat Low-key Dunks on You

**Author's Note:**

> FOLLOW YOUR WEIRD OLD TRASHMOM AT [MY WEIRD TUMBLR](totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

You stare the little monster down. He stares back, and for a second, you can swear his eyes flash dangerously at you. There is a moment where the two of you are frozen, time seemingly suspended as you each get the measure of the other. You have to move with absolute precision, you know, you can’t let him land a single attack, or-

His eyes widen at the first hint of motion, and he takes off, whipping around the corner into the kitchen. You grimace. “Oh, you giant butthole,” you sigh, and resignedly pull down the sleeves of your flannel, preparing for war. After all, your pal had no compunctions about drawing blood, not if it meant he didn’t need to get into the cat carrier. It takes a good ten minutes to fish Ghost out from under the kitchen table, and in that time, the normally sweet (if stupid) gray cat has transformed into a hissing, clawing, panicked little mess. “I know, bud, I know.” You sigh, trying to navigate him into his carrier. He’s got all four paws latched to the door, and you’re trying your best not to hurt him. Oh, god, you’re going to be late, you never plan enough time for this, and the vet is so stern about punctuality. “Ghost, oh my god, please.” You beg. “Just. Get. In.” He yowls, but at last a foot slips and he’s halfway through the door.

With one last shove, he’s inside his plastic prison, and you quickly swing the door shut before he can turn around and get out. The serenade begins. His pitiful meows fill your ears as you ease him into the passenger seat of your little blue convertible. You tug the canvas roof up quickly, knowing that the elderly cat is already panicked enough without the feeling of the wind in his fur or the noise of rushing air. Then you’re off, one slightly bleeding human, one miserable cat, the prospect of an unhappy series of vaccinations and lectures about tartar in your future.

As Ghost gets older, it seems like you’ve been doing this more and more often; aside from the yearly checkups, there was the bee sting on the nose incident, the time he walked on freshly poured asphalt, the time he’d just stopped eating for three days (well, that time it had turned out he’d figured out how to open the bin you kept his kibble in and had just been gorging himself while you slept). As a result, you knew the routine pretty well. Check in with the friendly receptionist, go to the left - into the waiting room that was reserved for cats - and then wait to be scolded by the vet. Ghost was poking his paw out of one of the breathing holes, trying to claw at your leg, so it was probably unsurprising that you didn’t notice that anything was amiss right away.

“Hey, Cadence, just bringing the little savage in for his shots.” You say, finally looking up at her with an apologetic grin. Does she look a little pale? She doesn’t say anything, just nods. Odd. You smile at her again, and haul your cargo over to the cats’ side of the waiting room, again, focused on avoiding Ghost’s claws. You don’t notice what had the receptionist so out of sorts until you plop down next to it. Well, him.

What makes you look up is actually the panting. Loud, interspersed with sniffing and a soft whine. Oh, god, if there’s anything bound to make Ghost panic more, it’s a poorly trained dog getting in his space. Looking up from the carrier, you start to say, “Hey, sorry, this side is supposed to be for cats only, I think. I hate to make you move but dogs make my little monster here freak… out...” You begin to trail off as you make eye contact (skull contact?!) with the skeleton sitting next to you. He winks.

“oh, am i _your_ little monster? don’t worry, babe, i’ll do my best to keep calm.” How the fuck does a skeleton smirk?!

“Oh. Oh, fuck.” You stammer. “Was that like…really bad?” Your face is turning beet red. You want to tunnel five million miles underground where nobody will ever see you ever again. “I didn’t mean ‘monster’ like… ‘monster monster!’ It’s just a nickname from before we knew that you guys were even real… ugh. Oh god.” You bury your face in your hands, then peek between your fingers. The skeleton is enjoying himself immensely, you can tell. He’s grinning so big that his eye sockets are squeezed half shut - okay, now that didn’t make much sense, but that’s what was happening. Sitting politely on a chair next to him, a large white dog was also regarding you with interest. There was a remarkable amount of intelligence in his eyes, enough that it soon registered with you that the dog had to also be a monster. Oh, double fuck. “I really didn’t mean anything by it, guys.” You mumble into your hands.

“relax, kid.” The skeleton finally decides that he’s done holding you over the coals. His smile grows a little more friendly, and when you still fail to emerge from your thoroughly embarrassed position, he nudges your shoulder with his gently. “it’s no big, really. your little pal there looks about twice as smart as some monsters i know.” He nods at the carrier, and you quickly curse again, realizing that in his desperate effort to escape, Ghost has actually managed to unlatch the door halfway. As you fix it, he speaks up. “sorry about being in the temm- um, the... cat waiting room, too? i think that the receptionist was a little surprised to see two handsome guys like us walk through the door, so she didn’t tell us exactly where to go. you still need us to split?” He tilts his skull at you.

You clear your throat. “Oh, jeez. No, thanks so much for being so nice, though. I was only worried that there was a dog that might get up in Ghost’s face.” You admit with a laugh. The skeleton stares at the cat through the bars for a moment. He’s trying to figure out if the cat is just named Ghost, or really is a ghost, maybe? Finally, he clears his throat and grins at you again.

“well, you won’t do that, will you, l.d.?” The skeleton asks the dog, almost reproachfully. The dog lowers his eyes and whines slightly. “yeah, that’s what i thought.” His skull swivels back towards you. “see, my pal here still isn’t used to being out of the underground, and he’s kinda still figuring a few things out. like, you know, that on the surface you don’t eat random lizards that you find in your friend's backyard, right?” He says, the end of the sentence clearly directed at the sheepish dog. “we don’t know if it’ll hurt him or anything, so my friend alphys used the internet to see what you should do if a dog eats a weird lizard and it said to take him to a vet. so, uh, here we are.” The dog, L.D.(?) whines softly again. Talking clearly isn’t his forte. You’re distracted by something else, though.

“Did you just say Alphys? Yellow, glasses, about yay tall?” You gesture vaguely. The skeleton nods, looking surprised.

“uh, yeah. we’re pretty tight. you know her?”

“Well, kinda. Her girlfriend, Undyne, just started working at the aquarium downtown with me. Actually, I trained her. I mean, as much as it takes to train someone to give penguins fish.” You say with a wide smile. Well, it had taken a little training, actually, but you weren’t about to tell this skeleton that you’d lectured Undyne several times about eating the penguins’ food, especially since he seemed so worried about the lizard incident. “Alphys came by on our lunch break yesterday to see how everything was going. Also, I guess Undyne had forgotten her pasta at home.” You chuckled, then something clicked. “Oh! Gosh, I think they actually told me about you? They kept talking about a really nice skeleton who they always hung out with. They went on and on about how awesome you are!” You exclaim, excited to be meeting this friend already. The short skeleton glances down at his lap, grinning and blushing bright blue - you notice it matches his parka. “Yeah, I’ve already heard tons about you. Sorry, god, where are my manners? I’m _____, and you’re Papyrus, right?”

You’ve never heard a dog crack up laughing before. 


	2. In Which You Make a Really Bad Pun at a Receptionist

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey I'm just giving you guys two chapters at once, so enjoy, uh, still being in the waiting room. I'm so stoked to hear what you guys think!  
> Oh and I'll keep mentioning you can also keep track of me and this at totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com

When it becomes clear that you’ve managed to name the wrong skeleton, you consider retreating back behind your hands, but in spite of the dog’s mirth, the short skeleton sitting next to you looks, if anything, pleased.

“nah. close though. papyrus is my brother. he really is awesome, though. he’ll be so happy to hear that he’s got a reputation for being cool even with strange humans. it’ll warm him to the bone.” He says with a grin. You narrow your eyes at the pun, thinking that surely a skeleton could do better than that. “anyway, i’m actually named sans. and this is lesser dog - l.d. is a little easier, though.”

“Oh!” You sit up. “Right, of course! I mean, obviously, they mentioned you too.” Alphys and Undyne had talked about another skeleton, a real joker who was very protective of Papyrus. Apparently, you gathered, that protectiveness extended to other monsters - he’d braved a human establishment to make sure that his dog friend was okay. “Well, I’m really pleased to meet you both.” Ghost chose that moment to hiss angrily, causing you to say, “That’s not anti-monster sentiment from the kitty, promise, Ghosty just hates the vet.” Lesser Dog gave you an anxious look, causing you to quickly explain, “Oh, no, sweetie, don’t worry, the vet’s a really nice guy, you don’t need to be worried. Ghost just isn’t as smart as you, so he doesn’t understand that the vet isn’t trying to hurt him when he’s giving him medicine.” Lesser Dog seems reassured at this, but Sans nudges your shoulder again as soon as the dog is distracted by something out the window.

“the vet guy. he’s going to be cool?” He says, low and casual. You see what he’s getting at almost instantly. Monsters hadn’t necessarily gotten the warmest reception in this town, or, hey, in any other town. They were brand new, many of them seemed terribly different from the people who had always lived here, and they all seemed to have access to a suspicious amount of gold. Wars had been fought between different groups of humans for those very reasons for millennia. The behavior of many of your fellow humans towards the monsters had been as predictable as it was deplorable.

“I think so…” You start, then bite your lip. Sans is watching you closely. You don’t notice the pinpricks of light in his eyes dart to your mouth for a second before meeting your eyes again. You’re too busy thinking about how awful it would be if your hunch about the veterinarian was wrong. “But I could go in with you guys… if that’s okay.” You say, looking over Sans’ shoulder at the excited dog. “Ghost only needs a few shots anyway, and humans tend to … behave, better, if they know that they’re being watched?” You attempt.

Sans looks distant as he mutters, “not quite sure that’s true.” He scratches the dog’s back distractedly for a while, ignoring the rapturous expression on Lesser Dog’s face. “hey, thanks, pal, but i think we’ll be okay on our own.” He finally decides. “wouldn’t want to be a _purrden_ on you and Ghost.” He gives you a wide, false smile. You groan.

“That was terrible. And you wouldn’t be a burden, really, I-”

“i think it was the _cat’s pajamas_.” Sans interrupts pointedly. You realize he’s trying not to let on that he’s worried, for the sake of the dog.

“You should have _vetted_ that joke better.” You sigh, the corners of your mouth turning up. Sans beams at you.

“nice one! it’s better if you _paws_ for effect, though.”

“That’s where I draw the _feline_.” You drawl.

Sans snickers, and then glances up quickly when the receptionist appears in the doorway to squeak out, “Sans and, er, Lesser Dog, room two?” Sans stretches, and then smiles encouragingly at Lesser Dog.

“c’mon, bud. kid, nice to have met you. maybe i’ll see you around sometime?” You look up at him, seeing the kind and reassuring way he’s looking at his enthusiastic canine companion, and for a second you don’t care that Ghost’s managed to claw your leg through one of the holes in the door of his cage. Seeing someone so dedicated to keeping his friend safe, in spite of the uncertainty of what kind of reception he might get… it fills you with determination.

“I’d love that, Sans.” You find yourself saying, your voice stronger and more sincere than you’d heard it in, well, a while. He pauses in mid-step, and glances back at you. The tiniest blue flush creeps across his cheeks.

“well… throw a guy a _bone_ here, _______, gimme your number.” You feel your own cheeks begin to warm yet again - you aren’t even a blusher! - and you open your mouth to respond when the receptionist pipes up.

“Uh, sir? It’s just that the vet, he’s waiting for you, and he’s really tight on time, so..”

“Go in!” You urge. You don’t want to jeopardize Lesser Dog’s treatment if the vet is irrationally angry at the monsters for wasting his time. “I’ll get your number from Undyne and text you, promise.” Sans nods, nudging Lesser Dog in the right direction. When the door closes to the exam room, the receptionist clears her throat.

“I think that skeleton was… hitting on you, _______.” She says, with clear disgust in her voice. You feel a shock of anger travel through you, but then you smile at her, sickly sweet.

“I’m pretty sure I was the one thinking about jumping his bones, Cadence.” You purr, less concerned about the truth of that statement than making sure that she knows you and her are not on the same team. Then you notice that you’ve made a pun. Oh, great. It’s rubbing off. Still, it’s worth it to see the receptionist turn chalk white once more. She beats a hasty retreat, and you stare down at Ghost. “I hope they’re okay in there.” You tell the cat. Ghost meows mournfully back at you.

\---------

You’re called into exam room four before Sans and Lesser Dog reappear. You try to take that as a good sign; surely, if things were going down badly, you’d have seen them burst out. Or at least heard some barking, you think anxiously, picking up Ghost’s carrier and hauling him onto the exam table. Now that you’re in the exam room, Ghost has no interest in leaving the carrier; he knows what’s coming next. He cowers in the back, eyes enormous. You jerk upright when the vet finally comes in. He’s a distinguished older man with dark skin and a meticulous gray mustache. “Dr. Stanley, hi.” You say, trying not to sound too strained. He smiles calmly at you.

“_________. Just the annual shots today, right? No more midnight feasts for Ghost?” You chuckle guiltily.

“Heh, right. I, um, I found a better place to keep his food so he can’t keep helping himself.” You say, then blurt out, “Hey, so you just saw my, uh, friends ... Sans and L.D., and I just wantedtomakesurethey’reokay-” You stop, seeing the stern expression on Dr. Stanley’s face.

“You’ve heard of doctor/patient confidentiality, surely.” He says, fishing your cat effortlessly out of the carrier. You’re too distracted by the conversation to be bitter that Ghost is so much more compliant for the vetrinarian.

“Oh, uh, does that apply to vets?” You say, caught off guard. “I mean, I’ve told people if one of the penguins or puffins at work is sick before.”

“Are you implying that a monster is the same as a non-sentient bird?” The vet says pointedly. Ghost is limp in his hold, accepting his fate now. You gape at him for a second.

“God, no! Lesser Dog just ate that lizard and I don’t know if magic animals can even get poisoned or anything, and I don’t know how to help them if you weren’t able to…”

“Shh.” Dr. Stanley advises, smiling just a little again. “I assure you, those two weren’t the first monsters I’ve met. I’ve actually been in touch with a monster who specializes in biology, to make sure that I’m able to treat any new patients competently.” He administers the first shot. Ghost is out of complaints by this point, and is reduced to staring pathetically at you. You scratch the cat’s head, feeling relieved.

“Oh. Well. I’m very glad to hear that.” You say.

There’s a pause, and the vet adds, innocently, “You’ll probably be glad to hear that there’s no poisonous lizards within two hundred miles of Mt. Ebott. Any dog, magical or otherwise, that managed to eat one, would be fine. Maybe a little indigestion.” Well, that’s two for two as far as good news goes. You’re about to beam at the vet when he looks sternly up at you. “Now let’s talk about this tartar buildup. Have you been brushing Ghost’s teeth?” You’re about to protest how impossible that would be when you see your cat, mute, obedient and pliant in the vet’s hold. You mentally sigh, and submit yourself to the ensuing lecture on the importance of feline dental hygiene.

\---------------

-so you wanna jump my bones, huh?-

the text is unexpected, lighting up your phone just as you’re about to fall asleep that night. Ghost peeks one yellow eye open from his spot on the pillow next to yours, and glares at you as if it’s your fault the phone’s just vibrated. You cuddle him for a second as punishment for his bad attitude, then scoop the phone up. You open the text from an unknown number, read it and feel your stomach plummet with embarrassment. Oh god. You could just ignore this, you suppose. Maybe you could play it off as if he had the wrong number? You consider it, then imagine Sans sitting there, deciding to text you. Well, god, you assumed it was Sans.

-You’ve got awfully good hearing for a guy with no ears.-

You type out the deflection, and hover over the send button for a long time before finally squeezing your eyes shut and pressing it. There. Great job, _______. Playing it real real cool. Minutes creep by. You consider trying to go to sleep again. When the phone buzzes, almost fifteen minutes later, you snatch it up anxiously.

-i don’t. the dog does-

Sans’ explanation is somehow even more embarrassing. You can just imagine the innocent dog passing that tidbit on to Sans, unaware of the implication. Sure, the dog couldn’t talk, but you didn’t think for a second that this was a barrier between monsters. Or worse, what if he’d said it to more people than Sans? God, what if he’d communicated it in front of Undyne! She’d torment you at work. You groan for a second, then think hard. If Undyne knew you’d said that, she wouldn’t torment you at work. She’d already be tormenting you. You’re probably safe. Feeling slightly relieved, you type quickly.

-Well, I had to say something to make it clear how ducking rude the receptionist was being.-

You notice the autocorrect error only after you press send and groan, knowing what’s coming.

-glad you did. me and the dog were quacking up.-

-GOODNIGHT, SANS-

You put your phone down after setting the alarm. You’re almost asleep again when you remember that you never had given Sans your number after all. He must have asked Alphys or Undyne for it. If you’d embarrassed yourself, the skeleton must have done the same just for the chance to text you. The thought makes you smile as you finally drift off.


	3. In Which Undyne Nearly Flexes Out of the Room

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi there.  
> Thanks so much for reading and writing on my thing.  
> You guys aren't like all those others. You're alright.  
> *BROAD WINK* *JAZZY MUSIC* *COOL POSE*

“SO.”

The word hangs in the air, loaded, the second you hang up your coat in the locker at work the next day. You take a deep breath and turn to face Undyne. The woman is still wearing her own leather jacket, leaning across the wall of lockers, giving you a huge, pointy smile.

“So?” You say innocently, grabbing your work boots from the bottom of your locker and tugging them on, trying not to fall over as you do so.

“So. You made a friend yesterday.” Undyne sings. If anything, her smile grows wider. You play it cool.

“I make lots of friends. You’ll have to be more specific.”

“ERGH. ________! You _know_ who I’m talking about.” She stomps. The floor shakes slightly, and you glance down nervously.

“Er, Undyne, maybe less stomping? This room is right above the stingray tank, I think?” Undyne freezes, then very slowly, very calmly takes her jacket off, changing for work as well. She seems terminally unable to do so without flexing.

“So.” She tries again, after an agonizing thirty seconds. “Why did my friend Sans text me asking for your number?” She gives you another gleaming, fake-polite smile.

“About that,” You say. “Do you just give any guy my number, Undyne?”

“I know Sans. I figure he had a good reason. Stop changing the subject.” She grumbles, holding the locker room door open for you. You’re both wearing blue t-shirts with the aquarium’s logo on them, khaki pants, and the all too necessary boots - you’d slipped on penguin poop way too many times to try to get away with just wearing sneakers. You walk out with her, heading to the room where the penguins’ morning meal is stored.

“We met at the vet’s office yesterday.” You finally admit.

“Oh, man, what did your cat do?” Undyne says, looking apprehensive. You’re a little embarrassed that you’ve barely known this woman for two weeks, and you’ve already told her enough about Ghost to make her fear the worst.

“Nothing!” For once. “Just getting him his shots.”

“What are shots?!” She asks, sounding excited. “Oh, man, is that an upgrade like Alphys does to robots? Is ‘shots’ an attack he can do?” You’d been having this kind of exchange since you first met. It never failed to make you laugh.

“Oh man, no, thank god he can’t. No, shots are-”

She slaps a wet feeling, webbed hand against your mouth before you can go into detail. You do your best not to be insulted. “Wait. Explain later. You’re getting off track again.” Her yellow eyes glint, and she pulls her hand away and pushes the door to the refrigerated feed room open, casually picking up two heavy buckets of fish in each hand. She is ridiculously ripped, you think, a little jealous.

“Well, Sans was bringing Lesser Dog in. He ate a lizard.” Undyne begins to cackle at that, and helps you as you struggle to get your arms around the last bucket of fish.

“Oh my god. Lesser Dog is such a WEIRDO!” She crows.

“Hey! I liked him. He’s cute!” You argue back, unwilling to have the guilty looking creature maligned any further.

“Lesser Dog or Sans?” Undyne bats her eyelids innocently. You glare, and nod at the door to the penguin enclosure.

“Shh. You ready?”

“I’m always ready!” She boasts, and pushes the door open. Several seconds later, you’re both knee deep in squalling, squawking penguins, each acting like they’d been starving for days (when you knew for a fact they’d been fed at closing last night). Sitting on a fake rocky outcrop, you began tossing fish out to the penguins, trying to get a fair distribution to your charges. Undyne has a different method - she tosses the fish above the penguins’ heads, into the water, with an exceptional amount of gusto. The penguins love it, of course, since it’s almost like catching fish in the wild, but you worry about the little guys getting as much food as the bigger ones, so you stick to your method.

As always, you can feel the eyes of the aquarium visitors crawling on your back. That’s actually something you’re a little worried about. It feels like attendance has tripled since Undyne started working with you. You suppose every dollar goes to supporting the animals here, and their wild counterparts, but you can’t help but worry that some of the tourists here see Undyne as an exhibit, rather than an employee. Ugh, you don’t know if you should mention that to her, or how to tactfully bring that up, but when you hear actually cheering and clapping coming from the other side of the glass, you glance up sharply, ready to curse out anyone who might be mocking your coworker.

“YES, UNDYNE! THROW THE FISH WITH ALL OF YOUR MIGHT!”

“Y-yeah, sweetie! Good job!”

Oh. Oh god almighty, are you blushing again? In the front of the crowd - and being given a wide berth by many of the other guests - are three monsters and a small human. You can make them out through the glass separating the exhibit from the public - it’s tinted for the penguins’ sake, but it can’t be mirrored or they’d forever be crashing into it. Alphys is beaming at Undyne, who stops what she’s doing to give a wave to her friends. After a second, you do the same.

Standing next to Alphys is a tall skeleton, already wearing an aquarium t-shirt and a souvenir baseball cap. He’s waving back at the two of you so enthusiastically you begin to worry he’ll hurt himself. You figure that this one simply has to be Papyrus. You can’t get that one wrong twice. Next to him, of course, is Sans. He’s looking down at a small human - a child - who’s clutching at his bony hand. That’s true affection on his face, you recognize. You’re trying to figure out how you know the kid, when Sans looks up at you. His grin grows cheekier, and he gives you a quick wink. Shit! Caught staring. Flustered, you begin redistributing fish at double speed, much to the penguins’ delight.

“Hey, they brought Frisk!” Undyne says, sounding delighted. “I can’t believe nobody told me Frisk didn’t have school today! I can’t believe FRISK didn’t text me, we’re besties! Oh my god, _______, how do you still have fish left!?” Her buckets are empty, so she digs into yours, but does take more care this time to make sure the chicks and the older penguins get their fair share.

“YES, MY FRIEND AND MENTOR UNDYNE IS CERTAINLY A WONDERFUL CARETAKER OF THESE SMALL AND DAPPER BIRDS!” You can hear the bellow of the tall skeleton clearly over the squawking of the penguins, and you look over at Undyne, chuckling.

“Sounds like you’ve got a big fan, Undyne.” Undyne grins, less wolfishly this time.

“That’s Pap. I’ve told you about him a thousand times already. Oh, but of course you know about him already. It’s your new boyfriend’s brother.” She says, the evil look returning to her face. You pray desperately that Sans wasn’t lying last night when he said he didn’t have super hearing.

“Undyne, please? I’m enough of a mess when I’m not getting made fun of.” You say in an undertone. You’re not lying. When you’re embarrassed, you get clumsy, and god, apparently you even blush now? Is it possible that this is some magic and Sans is messing with you, you wonder? You really haven’t blushed so much in your entire life as you have in the past two days. Undyne, naturally, notices.

She manages to drop her voice as she pointedly asks, “Why are you so embarassed? Is there something wrong with dating my friend Sans? Is it, well … the skeleton thing? Do you think it’s wrong to date monsters?” She sounds like she’s teasing, still, but you can hear the sincerity of the question underneath her wicked tone. You groan again, and scoop the last few fish out of your bucket. You can practically feel the stares of your spectators on the other side of the glass.

“Of course not!” You hiss, head ducked a little, pretending to be focused on the birds. After a moment, you clear your throat and speak a little louder. “We haven’t known each other for that long, but you know I’m not like that, right? I mean, I hope I’ve made it clear. Monsters, humans, we’re all just… people. Souls, you know? You strip away the outsides, all the fur and blood and magic and whatever, and we’re the same. We all just want to be loved for who we are. I might be a mess who panics at the idea of being in a relationship, but it’s not because I think anything’s wrong about monsters and humans dating. God, the more love in this world, the better. This place could certainly use it.” Undyne’s expression goes awfully soft at the earnestness in your voice.

“Aw. Aw man. Okay, you big mushy weirdo. No more teasing about the bonehead.” She says, shoving your shoulder. You nearly topple off your rock, but you smile up at her all the same. “For at least… three hours.” She adds quickly, her grin growing. You roll your eyes and hop up, grabbing two empty buckets while she gets the rest, managing this whole time not to look back up at the gallery where the monsters and humans are watching you from. You’re relieved when you’re back in the tunnels that connect the different habitats, where no more interested eyes can follow you.

***********

Sans doesn’t have super hearing. Sans doesn’t need super hearing. He has something better. He has Frisk.

“hey kiddo.” he mutters, watching you and Undyne feed your small, hungry responsibilities. Papyrus is distracted by all the little birds, not to mention the sight of Undyne working so … energetically. Alphys is distracted by that too, though the childlike delight in Papyrus’ expression isn’t mirrored on the small dinosaur’s face - Sans can tell she’s having sinful thoughts. Good for her, he thinks, and looks back at Frisk.

“can you do me a little favor?” Frisk grins up at him, and holds both palms up, see sawing them. Sans chuckles. “maybe?” he drawls. “c’mon kid, throw me a bone. yeah, yeah, I know, that’s an old one.” He cuts off Frisk’s predictable complaint. Seeing the penguins splashing in their artificial antarctic sea, he tries again. “can you tell me… water they saying?” Frisk smiles. That was a new one.

Leaning so close to the glass that their forehead touches it, Frisk watches your lips move closely, signing along rapidly. Sans translates the signs in his head, lagging behind the conversation just enough that he can’t match up your expression with what you’re saying. By the time he’s pieced together your big defense of human monster relations, you’re already out of sight. Goddamn it, he thinks, leaning forwards so his skull also rests against the cool glass. You weren’t just funny, or cute, you were sweet too. People like you didn’t last long in this world, he muses, feeling just a little bit of worry twisting below his ribs. But still. Underneath all the blood and fur and magic, he supposes you were right. You were more or less the same. Just two skeletons trying to make the new world a little better. He glances down when he felt a tug on the sleeve of his parka. Frisk was beaming up at him.

“hey, what’s so funny, kid?” Sans drawls. Frisk hops up and down twice, before calming down enough to sign

* **icy** you like her!*

Not even Frisk could dodge the ensuing noogie.


	4. In Which An Irritable Parrot Threatens To Start Some Sort of War, Probably

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm posting these way too fast.  
> whatevs. I got a fever and the only cure is writing more chapters about you falling in love with a videogame skeleton.
> 
> if u have questions, I have answers! get at me at totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com  
> if u have complaints, I have general apathy!  
> if u have a christmas warmth in your heart, u should probably get that looked at. I don't know. I'm not a doctor.

After feeding time, you and Undyne are officially free agents until it’s dinner time for the penguins. When Undyne knows a little more about all the exhibits, you’ll start to split up and wander around in the public areas, answering questions, but for now, you’re still showing her how to take care of all the different animals, in case she’s needed in a pinch, and explaining things to her so that she actually can answer some visitors’ questions. There’s still a lot to catch up on. In the old days underground, Undyne has explained, unintelligent beasts were fairly rare - the monsters that looked like animals were, well, still monsters, like Lesser Dog. Even the spiders were intelligent entrepreneurs. The thought makes you shudder slightly. As much as you’ve kept an open mind to monsters since the day the barrier fell - god, it was just over a year ago now! - spiders unnerve you. Well, as long as they didn’t set up shop in your house, they were probably okay.

Was that a spider entrepreneur joke you’d just thought of? You’d have to tell Sans. Or, you quickly amend, any other lover of fantastic jokes. 

Undyne’s not paying as much attention as usual as you go through the rounds, too excited about the prospect seeing everyone on your lunch break.That’s understandable though, she’s been so focused and enthusiastic these past two weeks that you can’t help but feel she deserves a little slack. You decide she should get a treat for learning so much already … and, yeah, for dropping the teasing for three hours. Over the last two weeks, you’ve already showed her the tropical tank, the tidal tank, the stingray exhibit, the local creatures section, and of course, all the big guys you might be responsible for feeding - the sea otters, harbor seals, sea lions and the belugas, who got fed by other employees in much the same way you cared for the penguins. 

Undyne didn’t know much about marine biology, of course, but she could do something terribly useful. She could just intuit how the aquatic creatures were feeling, if they were sick or hungry or scared. Since the penguins weren’t the most emotionally available little guys - and the fish even less so - this had already turned out to be a lifesaver. Even if the aquarium had hired her just for people to gawk at (please, don’t make that be the case), they were going to make their money back on her, you just knew it. 

“C’mon. Let’s go learn something new.” You urge. “You haven’t seen the Jungles of the Amazon room yet, right?” Undyne shakes her head quickly, her sudden eagerness reminding you of her friend Papyrus’ enthusiasm. You grin. She’s going to like this. Guiding her through the ‘disney tunnels’ (another reference you hadn’t managed to explain properly to her yet), you pushed a door open, very carefully, to the heat and humidity of an artificial jungle. 

“Oh, gross, too hot!” She complained. You snickered. 

“Come on, you big wimp. You can’t hide in a cold cave with the penguins forever. Come on, I want you to see these guys. Watch your head, though, there’s-”

“AH!” Undyne leaps backwards, startled by a scarlet macaw swooping overhead. Suddenly, out of nowhere, there’s a glowing spear clutched in her hand, and she’s crouched defensively. You freeze still, and then glance around quickly. Thank god, you’re out of eyesight of any visitors. You can just see the headline now: Fish Monster Threatens Innocent Children - Is Your Family Next?

“Hey. Hey.” You whisper. “You’re okay. Just a bird. Like our penguins, just… in the air, you know? And, uh, redder. They’re allowed to fly around free in here.” You say, soft and soothing. Undyne holds her defensive pose for another excruciatingly long second, then suddenly the spear vanishes. 

“I know what birds are. Obviously, nerd. I was just startled.” She grumbles self consciously. You swallow roughly. You don’t want to know what’s happened to her to leave her so on edge. Well, you do want to know. It’s just upsetting to think about the fact that she’s been hurt before. 

“Well, bud, I’m glad to see that you’ll be able to keep me safe if they ever go all Hitchcock on us.” Undyne snorts a laugh out at that, and relaxes. You rack your brains to try to figure out how she doesn’t know what shots are, but she does know about Alfred Hitchcock, then mentally shrug. You know that the monsters you’ve met so far all seem heavily invested in VHS tapes, so there’s really no making sense of how they consume media. “Hey. You good to keep going?” You check, after another long moment. Undyne nods. 

“I’m ready. Just waiting for you, loser.” You’ve never heard as much affection in the words ‘nerd’ and ‘loser’ as when Undyne says them. 

“Awesome. C’mon, I want to show you something really cool!” You drag her over to the source of the sound of trickling water that echoes through the jungle room. A deep pool has been installed under artificial tree roots, with a thick sheet of plate glass forming a retaining wall so guests can see the fish inside. Undyne walks over, her brow furrowing as she stares at the fish. For right now, you don’t tell her anything, just let her gather what she can about them using… whatever magic it is that she uses.

***********  
“THEY’RE CALLED PIRANHAS!”

The hours until your lunch break had slid away. You’d texted your boss, asking if Undyne could take an hour instead of your normal half, since it was a relaxed day and she’d been doing awesome. Your boss had answered quickly - you both could have an hour long break, not to worry, and she’d just call if there were any fires that needed putting out. So now you were in the entrance hall, near the ticket takers and the giant jellyfish display, listening to Undyne gush about her discoveries. You’d only just gotten the chance to introduce yourself to Papyrus and Frisk when Undyne had launched into her tirade. 

“Th-that’s neat, sweetheart.” Alphys says, with significantly less excitement. It’s not that she’s not excited, just that nobody could be as excited as Undyne right now. Frisk has to hop up to catch Undyne’s attention. They begin to sign quickly. 

“frisk is saying that they think sharks are way cooler than piranhas.” You nearly jump out of your skin. Sans has managed to sidle up behind you without you noticing. He’s the perfect height to murmur into your ear. You’re about to scold him, but you’re also thankful that he seems willing to translate. God, you wish you remembered more signs than just the dirty ones! That had been hilarious to learn when you were younger, but now, well, you couldn’t tell a kid to go off and fuck a tree.

“Thanks.” You say, practically drowned out by Undyne’s dissent. 

“NO, YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND! THEY’RE WAY SMALLER THAN SHARKS, BUT THEY’RE SO TOUGH!”

“super cool, pal.”

“NO SANS, YOU DON’T GET IT! ______ SAYS THEY CAN EAT A COW IN LIKE ONE SECOND!” You clear your throat. 

“That’s not exactly what I said.” You point out. 

“WELL I, FOR ONE, ALSO THINK THAT IT’S WONDERFUL, UNDYNE! I WOULD BE THANKFUL FOR THE CHANCE TO MEET YOUR FISH FRIENDS AFTER WE EAT! MAYBE YOU COULD GUIDE US AND TEACH US ABOUT THE WONDERS OF THESE CREATURES?” Well, Papyrus’ enthusiasm puts even Undyne’s delighted excitement to shame. Undyne looks at you with big, puppydog eyes. Papyrus, quickly figuring out that you’re the person who can make this happen, does the same. Those are actual stars dancing in his eye sockets. You consider it. You don’t need to feed the penguins again for another few hours, and your embarrassing walkie-talkie has been basically silent all day, so all you’re supposed to be doing is to continue training Undyne until you hear otherwise. She does need to learn about the subtleties of being a guide, you suppose. 

“Sure, dude. It’s good practice, anyway, you’re gonna have to show guests around eventually. But come on, we’ve only got forty-five minutes already, we’d better eat. Did you guys bring food?” You look up at the small cluster of monsters - and Frisk - hanging out in the aquarium entrance. Since it’s break time, you and Undyne have pulled jackets over your blue shirts, and are no longer distinguishable as employees, just as people who have terrible taste in shoes and pants. 

“nah. we’re taking you out.” Sans says. You glance over at him. “don’t worry, it’s like a block away. an old buddy owns it. grillby’s. great burgers. he does human food now too i guess. we all love it.” Suddenly, you feel awkward. Just because you usually had lunch with Undyne these days didn’t mean that you could just crash this group’s good time. After all, well, they clearly all went way back, and you were just… you’d just plopped in there. 

“You know, there’s probably some paperwork I could catch up on.” You mumble. “Maybe you should go, Undyne, have a good time and I’ll make sure that both our care logs are in good shape?”

“What?!” Undyne looks at you, perplexed and a little hurt. “Don’t be such a dweeb!”

“PLEASE, DO COME, HUMAN. UNDYNE HAS TOLD ME ABOUT SO MANY OF YOUR GREAT FEATS WITH THE FANCY BIRDS! AND THEN MY BROTHER TOLD ME ALL ABOUT THE KIND HUMAN HE MET AT THE DOG REPAIR STORE! I’VE BEEN SO EXCITED TO MEET YOU!” Papyrus begs. Frisk nods quickly, clinging to Papyrus’ leg.

“I just don’t want to crash your party.” You say quietly, feeling guilty that you’d upset Undyne now. 

“hey.” something cool and hard slides around your wrist. You look around to see white phalanges encircling your forearm, tugging your hand away from the keychain you’d been reaching for. “we all want you there. promise. this isn’t a monsters only reunion. look, the kiddo’s psyched to have another human around.” Sans says calmly. Frisk beams, clinging to Papyrus’ femur and nodding. “besides, i owe you a big one. you really tried to stick your neck out for me and the dog. least i could do is get you a burger.”

“You didn’t even let me do anything!” You argue, but you can’t keep the smile off your face. 

“yeah, but you did something anyway.” Sans says quietly. You recall the texts from last night, that he knows you told the receptionist that you were considering jumping his bones, and you feel that dreaded, new sensation of burning cheeks. 

“SANS, WHY IS THE HUMAN CHANGING COLORS? YOU AREN’T DOING MAGIC, ARE YOU BROTHER?” Papyrus is as innocent as a newborn kitten (not your kitten, maybe, but one that didn’t take offense at all your blood being inside your body). Undyne, who is cackling like a madwoman, is less so. Alphys has to save you in the end.

“L-let’s go, guys. Leave, uh, leave poor ________ alone, Papyrus.” She says, holding the door open.

“I AM NOT BOTHERING HER! I AM SIMPLY CONCERNED FOR HER HEALTH!” Papyrus insists, striding out the door and carrying the clinging Frisk with him. Undyne smirks at you for a long second, then follows them. It’s just you and Sans in the lobby now. He’s still holding onto your wrist. 

“seriously, don’t make me _grill_ you on this one anymore. come get a bite.” He says firmly. You finally smile and acquiesce.   
“Fine. Let’s get going then, I still want to show, well, help Undyne show you guys around, so we gotta be on time!” You say brightly. Sans beams up at you, and finally lets your wrist go. It’s funny, you think. Sans was incredibly gentle with your arm, but you somehow got the sense that if he really wanted to hold on, nothing could have pried those bones off you.

You kind of like that. 

…

Yikes.


	5. In Which There is a Cute Mistletoe Scene that is Not Involving You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Would I lie to you? After all this time? Me and ¥ou* guys go way back.  
> You are not involved in this cute mistletoe shit.  
> Also please hand in your signed permission slips for the feels trip.  
> Potter, not you. You have to stay here and... I don't know, be punished for being an orphan I guess.   
> Okay, I'd better post this before I start going on a long rant about McGonnigal's rationale in PoA. T.S.T. OUT!
> 
>  
> 
> *(No, that's not a typo. Why did I do that? Ask me on totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com and I promise I'll give you a totally satisfying answer. *BROADER WINK* *EVEN JAZZIER MUSIC*)

Grillby’s really wasn’t far away, thank god. You wondered how you’d never been there, since you figured you’d had takeout from just about every restaurant within walking radius of the small aquarium. When you got closer, though, you realized you recognized the place; you’d just never gone in, too intimidated by the giant bouncer who always seemed to be hanging outside the door. He was a human, but at first glance he could easily be mistaken for some sort of minotaur monster - the guy was, to put it lightly, swole. 

He smiled like an angel when he saw your group approach. 

“Sansy! Buddy! Where you been, man?” He asked. “Oh, man, Paps and Undy too!”

“I told you not to call me that.” Undyne said icily, then grinned, shoving the guy’s shoulder. He stumbled two steps, then looked askew at Undyne.

“Girl, you gotta stop doing that, I’m gonna get fired if bossman sees that shit! Oh, uh, sorry kid.” He said, finally noticing Frisk, who’d hitched a ride on Papyrus’ leg the entire way like some sort of sloth. “Seriously, Sans, where’d you go, man? Not like you to disappear for a month.” 

“been busy.” Sans said lightly. “don’t worry, i actually paid my tab this time.”

“Fat chance. Go on in.” The bouncer chuckled, holding the door open. You smile politely at him as you enter the pub, and feel him sizing you up. Ugh, you hate that. You also want to tell him that, no, these bird poop stained pants are not your normal going out clothes. You don’t say it, but you consider it pretty damn seriously.

Inside, it’s warm, and dim, and smells amazing, like a campfire and pine needles and good food all at once. It’s been decorated for christmas, with sprigs of holly hanging from the wooden sidings of the booths, and garlands of balsam decorated with ornaments and christmas lights lining the trim on the wall. It doesn’t look like a dive bar that requires a bouncer. It looks like a place that people would grab a drink or two after work. You don’t feel bad at all, bringing Frisk in here - outside, you’d been a little nervous. In fact, the whole thing seems oddly discordant.

“Does this place get enough trouble to need that guy?” You ask Sans. You keep noticing that you’ve fallen into step next to him. You’re not sure if it’s because he’s deliberately walking next to you, or if you’re just being awkward. Knowing you, probably the latter. 

Sans’ answer is interrupted by a wild whoop. As you pick your way through the space between tables at the rear of the group, Undyne has spotted mistletoe hanging from the ceiling above her. She doesn’t hesitate to scoop up Alphys, lifting her by the elbows to plant an ostentatious kiss on the dinosaur’s mouth. Alphys is sweating slightly by the time that she’s put down, but she looks pleased. You eye the mistletoe suspiciously, and sidle carefully around it, unwilling to give Undyne the satisfaction of teasing you - you can tell she’s watching you from the corner of her eye now. Sans watches you with a wry expression, then does the same. Better safe than sorry, you tell yourself. 

“the bouncer. he’s more of a … deterrent.” Sans explains after a moment. “a few months ago, before he started working here, things weren’t so great. some humans weren’t too cool with a monster owning property up topside. thought we should just stay underground where we were… comfortable.” He’s still smiling, but you can tell the difference already between a real smile, the look he gives Frisk and Papyrus (and at least once, you), and the one that seems like if he wasn’t smiling, he’d be snarling or sobbing or scowling or… something decidedly unhappy that started with an ‘s’.

“Oh, god. What happened?” You whisper. 

“some… jokers came in one night. with fire extinguishers and buckets.” Sans whispers tightly. You look blankly at him, and he nods pointedly behind the bar. Grillby is standing there, crackling there, swaying slightly, lighting the place up. You’ve never seen a fire elemental before. For a split second, you’re entranced. How much beauty had been spilled onto the surface the day the barrier came down? He had a pair of glasses balanced on nothing, assisting the vision of eyes that weren’t there. God, how could you not love monsters? How could you possibly see something like this being of pure energy, radiating power, who was doing nothing more menacing than wiping the bottom of a pint glass with a rag, and not be filled with wonder?

Then Sans’ words register. 

“Oh no.” You breathe. “Oh god. Sans, they didn’t…”

“they tried.” Sans says shortly. “grillbz is a lot faster than you’d think. he only got hit on the hand, and then he took the fire escape. pretty literal, huh?” He gives you a wry look. Your mouth is hanging open. “… at least he wasn’t facing them alone. i made sure the assholes cleared out of there. made sure they wouldn’t try again. no police records, no problems.”

“How many of them were there?” You’ve fallen behind the group a few steps, as they bicker about if they want a big table or to squish into a booth. 

“ten or so. maybe twelve.” Sans says, watching your face. You bite your lip.

“And how many monsters were there to help you guys out?” You say. Sans hesitates. 

“...just me.” He mutters. 

********************************

He’s ready for you to jerk back, to instinctively pull away. He’s already braced for that fear to cross your face. Apart from the kid, his interactions with humans have mostly been disappointing. Oh, sure, they act cool. If you’re young and open minded, there’s nothing cooler than supporting monsters. It’s kind of a trend, he figures. 

But then something happens to remind them that you can’t just scrape all that skin and fur and blood and magic away and be left with two identical skeletons. That speech you’d given Undyne was sweet, but you had to be awfully naive to even say it. You scrape that shit away, and you die. Even him, he’s just bones and magic and god does he feel it some days, does he ever fucking wish that there was something more substantial to hold him together, to keep him in one place. He feels like Gaster sometimes, like he’s falling apart, drifting into these clouds that nobody can see, nobody wants to see.

He wonders if that makes his old man proud. 

No human wants to think about the fact that they’re always at a disadvantage when they’re dealing with a monster. They don’t want to think that a pile of bones like Sans could render fifteen (yes, he knows the number, it was fifteen!) murderous humans so thoroughly broken down that they couldn’t even try to make up a story and call the cops on him; who would believe that one short monster in a parka and pink slippers could just dunk the shit out of fifteen grown men?

When he first got to the surface, he’d taken Papyrus to the boardwalk. Those were the early days, when people were still too mystified by the monsters to be really ready to hate them. Nobody had bothered them, more than pestering them for pictures and autographs. He’d taken his little brother on all the rides there just hadn’t been room for underground. They’d gone to the top of the ferris wheel and been so high up that he’d been able to see the horizon stretch, uninterrupted ocean, in his entire field of view. The world had seemed so big! Papyrus hadn’t looked at the horizon. His eyes were full of light as he admired the roller coaster. Of course they had to ride it. Papyrus had been thrilled, his grin nearly manic, as they inched up the hill, the anticipation whirring under Sans’ ribs. And then the freefall, the turns, the speed, the wind, the rush! Papyrus had been laughing like Sans had never heard him laugh. Then - bam. They’d reached the end, hit the brakes, lurched forward hard enough that they both banged their sternums on the restraints. Papyrus wasn’t laughing anymore. He looked near tears. The recoil had been too much, too sudden. “i guess you gotta know that’s coming, bud.” Sans had told him quickly. “next time we’ll be ready, huh?”

That was the thing about anticipation. That was the thing about letting yourself feel that rush of giddy joy. It ended, and it sucked. Sans has been on this ride one too many times in the past year. He watches your face. You’re going to jerk away, say something sharp and cold, intangible but real as a knife. Monsters were in horror films up here. You’re going to be horrified. 

He braces himself for the recoil.

**********************************

“Oh man, Sans, I’m so glad you were there!” You exclaim. “God, they didn’t hurt you, did they? Or the bar? If they hurt you, I swear to god, I’ll… I mean, I don’t know, but I’ll do something bad! I’ll put penguin poop on their doorsteps or something!” You say vehemently, then shake your head. “I’m so sorry. I mean it. God, what you must think of us. You finally get out of the underground and this is how we greet you?!” You feel such guilt and shame on behalf of your species that you don’t even notice the look of disbelief on his face.

Then, suddenly, bony arms wrap tight around you, hugging you hard. You gaze down on the white skull, your breath catching. Your arms are pinned to your sides, you can’t even hug him back or find the words to apologize again or…

“Called it. Totally called it.” Undyne’s deadpan seems to bring him back to his senses, and he quickly detaches. “You lovenerds gonna join us, or should we just go ahead without you?” She asks sweetly, showing every pointy tooth in her smile. 

“Undyneee,” you begin to whine, since you’re sure your three hours are not quite up, but Sans cuts you off. 

“love _nerds_?” He repeats. Undyne nods eagerly, still smiling hugely. “that’s… damn, that's hilarious.” He says, sounding resigned. “c’mon. let’s sit down before they all join in.” He narrows his eyesockets at Undyne (yes, it looks weird). “i’m the only one who’s supposed to be _pun_ ishing you guys.” Undyne groans. Papyrus, who has begun to listen in, lets out a shriek of despair. Frisk giggles. Alphys ducks her head. You divert every molecule of determination in your body towards not blushing, and smile at Sans. As you brush by him, the two of you taking the remaining free seats at the end of the table, you have to strain to hear a single whispered word.

“thanks.”


	6. In Which You Make a Pretty Good Burger (Pun)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember all those times I said you could send me asks at my tumblr?  
> Well, now you actually can, because I HAVE ACTUALLY INSTALLED AN ASK BOX, BECAUSE I AM A COMPETENT HUMAN BEING.  
> SO, SO COMPETENT.
> 
> TOTALSKELETONTRASH.TUMBLR.COM FOR ALL YOUR COMPETENT NEEDS.

Snuggled into bed that night, you can’t believe that you’re still smiling. God, you are such a dork, but you just can not get that smile off your face. The afternoon had just been… amazing. Unreal. You couldn’t remember the last time you’d laughed that hard, or felt so entirely welcomed. It was like you had spoken some secret codeword or something that everyone had been waiting to hear. It was like they’d all been waiting for you. Scratching under Ghost’s chin, you allow yourself to play a short highlight reel in your head, still smiling. 

Lunch had been just… oh, god, your ribs ached from laughing. The food had been wonderful. When you got stuck, trying to decide if you wanted a burger, hot dog, a salad or a big order of fries, Sans had leaned in. “get the burger special, frisk style.” He’d suggested. “it’s, uh, fusion cuisine.”

“Fusion cuisine?” You’d repeated, trying to figure out what he meant. “I don’t get it.”

“mostly human food, but there’s a little bit of magic in there too. kiddo loves it.” Frisk, who had been listening, nodded happily. Wait a second, listening? You’d gathered that Frisk signed because they were born without hearing, but Sans’ mouth just didn’t move the same way as yours did, and he didn’t sign, so how was Frisk responding? You resolved to ask someone later, then looked back at Sans. “sorry, guess my joke wasn’t that clear.” He said with a chuckle. 

“Well, a good burger joke is a _rare medium well done._ ” You said innocently. The table exploded with laughter, well, except for Papyrus, who was yelling that it wasn’t fair for both of you to make bad puns. And, yeah, except for Sans too. He stared at you like he’d never seen anything quite like you. Very slowly, an incredulous, delighted look crossed his face. Oh, you had certainly earned a real smile this time. Everyone noticed in stages, though all of Grillby’s had to notice when Papyrus yelled,

“DEAR HUMAN, I APOLOGIZE! YOU HAVE MANAGED TO SILENCE MY BROTHER. PLEASE DO COME OUT WITH US MORE OFTEN, I WOULD ENJOY MORE PEACE AND QUIET!” 

“R-really, Papyrus?” Alphys had to laugh, since Papyrus only had two volume options (loud and off), but when Papyrus’ skull swivelled to glare at her, she shrank down into her lab coat. “Uh…. I mean-”

“Hey! Nobody bullies my baby!” Undyne declared, hugging Alphys to her side and flexing menacingly with her free arm. Papyrus gulped and began to apologize profusely as Frisk sat back and enjoyed the chaos, a mischievous smile on their face. 

“you should, though.” The voice was quiet enough to just reach your ears. “come out with uh… us, more often.” Sans had a blue tint across both cheeks. Good! At least someone else seemed to be suffering the same blushing fiasco you were. And it was… okay, yeah, you could admit it to yourself, it was cute as all hell. You’d smiled brightly at the short skeleton. 

“Honestly? I’d love that, if you really don’t mind me hanging around.” You’d admitted. “You guys are all just… awesome.”

“well, right back atcha - oh, hey grillbz!” Sans’ volume had increased several degrees in magnitude as the proprietor came over to grab your orders.  
  
All too soon, you were slumped back in your seat, stuffed and feeling wonderful. Sans hadn’t been lying. It had been the best burger you’d ever, ever eaten. “How did it taste so good?” You’d began, grinning at Frisk and gesturing to the empty plate in front of you. Frisk clapped, and nodded at their own empty plate, then gave you a quick sign.  
“magic.” Sans supplied with a smirk.  
\------------------------  
The rest of the afternoon had been a blur of laughing and half hearted attempts to show Undyne the ropes. Your new friends had been only too willing to look at the animals they’d already looked at again, this time peppering you with all the questions they’d been wondering about the first time. Frisk had known a little more than the monsters, of course, but the kid also liked to make up facts and see if they could get the monsters to believe them, so you’d had to correct a few misapprehensions. No, the sharks could not shoot lasers (Papyrus had a tantrum at this). Yes, the cuttlefish could change colors. No, that wasn’t because of magic, Frisk. 

If it had been anyone else, you would have said that Sans was showing off. He was all smiles - he had been since the restaurant, where he’d put away a whole bottle of ketchup, making eye contact with you frequently as if he was hoping you’d make a comment. You’d decided not to play into his hand that easily, and had simply given him a lazy smile in return, as if you saw skeletons drinking bottles of ketchup every day. But that had only spurred him on. For every animal you’d showed them, he’d had a flurry of puns to unleash - though you’d had twice as many ready to retort with. Hey, you’d worked at the aquarium for a while, and until Undyne had showed up, the animals had (sadly) been your closest companions at work. You’d had plenty of time to think up every possible joke. As usual, though, Sans seemed less put out than absolutely thrilled that you were sometimes able to beat him at his own game. In fact, you were sure he was setting you up for your jokes a few times, since he laughed harder than usual when you completed the obvious pun.

You’d never been so reluctant to leave a tour group before. But suddenly, it was already practically closing time, and you and Undyne had real work to do. Those fish wouldn't throw themselves. You bid a reluctant farewell to Alphys, Papyrus, Frisk and Sans - though not before Papyrus had urgently typed your phone number into his and Frisk’s phone (“trust me, it’s better this way, he’ll figure it out anyway,” Sans had advised). 

Before you two had to peel off, plans to meet up again were brewing already; Alphys wanted to watch anime but they’d already gone through the library’s supply of VHS tapes, so she’d shyly asked you if you could explain how all the people on the computer were watching these shows. After several confusing minutes, you’d figured out that the monster internet and the human internet were two very different things; the monster one could store actual physical objects! No wonder they’d never weaned themselves off VHS tapes.

Eventually, after a good deal of silent thought on the pros and cons, you’d just told her that she and anyone else was welcome to come over and watch whatever on Netflix. It wasn’t like you didn’t have the space, right? Or the giant TV?

They’d all been staggeringly enthusiastic about it, enough that you felt pretty damn certain that they weren’t just being nice to you because you were Undyne’s weird coworker who had once pestered Sans in a waiting room. Papyrus had promised to bring food, which prompted a pleased look from Undyne, and a mildly panicked look from Alphys. Sans had merely grinned at you, his hands in his pockets. “i’ll bring some snacks too, pal, no worries.” He’d insisted, giving Papyrus a fond look when Papyrus began to argue that that wouldn’t be necessary because he’d make enough pasta for everybody. “just in case anyone wants something that’s not spaghetti, bro.”

“HOW COULD THAT BE POSSIBLE!” Papyrus’ horror was genuine, and you had just barely managed not to laugh. 

“So, awesome, we’ll all crash _________’s house tomorrow.” Undyne said, looking remarkably pleased. After some quick signs from Frisk, she sighed and added, “Except for the squirt who’s going to stay home and eat pie with their mommy like a _baby_!” Her attempt to rile Frisk up failed entirely. Frisk simply nodded contentedly, looking so sweetly at her that she eventually had to sigh and ruffle Frisk’s hair. “You’re too cute, kid.” She’d muttered. You agreed.

\--------------------  
Lying in bed, the highlights reel begins to flicker and warp as you think about this part. This had definitely not been your favorite part. They were actually coming here. You hadn’t had anyone here in… not since the monsters left the underground, at the very least. 

Maybe this was all a bad idea, maybe you shouldn’t have stuck your neck out like this, you don’t want this to happen all over again. It’s been such a short amount of time but you can’t stand the thought of losing them, him, like that. Oh, god, they would just form assumptions, they’d think you had so much, that you were just coasting by, being selfish, they’d think so little of you and then they’d leave and they’d leave another damn hole in your heart. That was the thing. You’d done this before. You’d told this story a few times, how you ended up on your own in a place that was too big, with a cat that was too old and rooms that were too empty and had too many memories. Nobody wanted to be around after that. They either wanted money you didn’t have and they left when they saw you weren’t lying about that, or they just faded away, not liking to think about what you’d been through.

You scraped away all the fur and skin and blood and magic, and people and monsters, you figured, they were the same. They didn’t feel comfortable when they had to acknowledge loss or sadness or pain, and so they avoided it. They came by less, until they never came by at all. You had to brace yourself, get ready for that, because you knew it was coming. You’d let yourself get attached already, you’d spent a golden afternoon feeling like you were fine and had friends, the sincerest people you’d ever met. Now, it was time to get ready for them to slip away.

After all, monster history said humans were horrible. He was going to be horrified. 

\-----------------------------

-hey pal. just wanted to thank you for showing us all around today-

You gathered your optimism back up into a little ball and smiled at the text. He was awfully sweet. 

-I had so much fun! I should be thanking you for getting my lunch, too!-

-told ya, least i could do. think i owe you again, anyway. paps and the kiddo couldn’t shut up about having the best day ever the whole way home-

Aw, that’s awesome. And, well, cute. Sans considered it a personal favor that you'd showed Papyrus and Frisk a good time. You found it pretty damn endearing, the way he seemed to watch out for the people he loved. 

-It’s a great place, isn’t it?-

-it’s got great people working there- 

Oh man, you are smiling like a lovesick schoolgirl. C’mon, dial it back some, _______. You work with penguins, for fuck’s sake, you should understand how to play it cool! Cool was your whole deal!

You were making penguin jokes in your head now. This is how it all ends. You grit your teeth and pick up your phone again. 

-Especially now that Undyne’s started!- 

There. Totally chill. 

-hard to tell where the greatness is coming from. tell ya what, how about sometime soon i take you out somewhere and we can see if you’re great solo?-

EEEEE. Okay. Got that out of your system, right? Maybe just a little more. EEEEEEEEEE.  
Ghost is staring at you like you have three heads. You try to wait a few minutes before you respond, but barely make it to two before you send a response. 

-Sounds great!-

-great-

-Great.-

-great-

-Goodnight, Sans.-

-great.-


	7. In Which Undyne Has to Use a Fifteen Year Old Italian Coffeemaker From Some Fancy Catalogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who knew that I would be writing a SUPER UNDYNE HEAVY FIC? Not THIS garbage person! But I love her, and similarly, I love you all, my beautiful trash angels. Come wallow with me. Yesssss. Roll in the trash.   
> <3  
> T.S.T.

You loved your days off so much. It wasn’t that you hated work; you were totally aware that you had one of the best jobs of all time. Penguins just got hungry so early in the morning! It just wasn’t fair that their internal clocks had them up with the sunrise, while you regularly stayed up past midnight, messing around on your computer or watching endless episodes of cooking competitions and serialized programs where hot young people fought demons (or vampires or whatever). Hey, you could watch garbage if you wanted! Who was going to call you out on it, Ghost?

(Actually, Ghost seemed pretty partial to Masterchef Junior). 

Anyways, days off meant that instead of getting out of bed at the asscrack of dawn, you could snuggle into your down comforter, mashing the snooze button for the alarm you’d helpfully set for yourself last night every ten minutes. When you finally opened your eyes, it was because Ghost absolutely refused to wait to get fed a second longer. He’d expressed that by lovingly pressing a paw on your mouth.

“Pluh! GHOST!” You sit straight up. “You butt, you dig in the litterbox with that paw!” Ghost hopped off the bed and twined around your ankles energetically as you made your way to the kitchen. Looking around on your way, you grimaced. You were going to have guests tonight. You’d gotten a little too comfortable, just being on your own, clearly. There was clutter everywhere. Every single one of Ghost’s toys was out again - he kept getting in the basket you stored them in. Ugh, and every possible surface had your books on them, mugs with dried teabags clinging pathetically to the side, piles of laundry you’d halfheartedly started to fold and then promised yourself you’d finish tomorrow…

Maybe it would just be easier to move the TV to one of the rooms you never used. 

Rubbing the sleepy feeling out of your eyes, you open a can of food for Ghost and carefully spoon half out into his bowl, then look longingly at the coffee maker. Yes. Lots of that. You needed fuel for your cleaning marathon. You start scooping twice as much as usual into a filter, when you hear it. 

“__________!”

For a second, your heart migrates into your esophagus. Nobody’s supposed to be in here! Is that a burglar? Or a murderer? Or those two guys from Home Alone, who might be both?

“__________!?” Oh. You know that voice. Your panic slowly fades. Not the Home Alone guys, then. 

“Undyne, what the hell?!” You call out. Ghost stops eating and blinks at you, bewildered. He’s not used to hearing other voices. 

“_________, where the heck are you? Jeez, you didn’t tell me that you lived in a freaking mansion!” Undyne yells. You cast one last longing look at the coffee grounds sitting in the filter, then set off to find her. She’s standing in the entry hall, looking awestruck. 

“Uh, hey. I didn’t… expect you until tonight?” You say, realizing that you’re still in your pajamas. Undyne looks around with wide eyes. 

“This place is like, bigger and fancier than the old royal palace.” She says, sounding a little confused. “I know what you get paid. Explain?” You scuff your foot awkwardly on the hardwood. 

“Uh, yeah. My mom and dad left it to me when they died.” You say quietly. “It’s not a big deal, honestly. I keep thinking I should just sell it.” Undyne stares at you, at a total loss. 

“Are you a princess or something?” She asks, her brow furrowed. You have to laugh at that. 

“No, c’mon, we don’t really have those anymore. I mean, we do, but they’re mostly for show… you know what, I’ll explain that later. Nah, my parents were scientists.” Undyne lets out a low whistle. 

“They must have been pretty good scientists.” She murmurs. 

“Uh… ha, yeah, I guess they were. So, um, what’s up?” Undyne’s eyes light up suddenly. 

“Right, you jerk, I texted you like a hundred thousand times and you didn’t even answer! You scared me!”

“Oh, ha, I think I left my phone under my pillow. Sorry, I sleep through like everything!” You apologize quickly. “You didn’t need to be scared though!” She glares bloody murder at you. 

“Do you always keep your front door to this giant place unlocked? Do you even have a security system? Do you need a guard dog? I know a bunch, they’ll work for dog food, I bet they could move in today?’ Undyne says accusingly, the topic shifting so fast you can barely keep track. 

“Woah, woah. Relax, I’ve never had any trouble. What’s up, Undyne?” You urge. She glances away from you for a long moment, then sighs and looks back. 

“One of us should have made sure you got home safe last night.” She says softly. “The news this morning…”

“Bad?” You mutter, feeling small in your pajamas in this giant stupid hall. 

“They beat up a _kid!_ ” She spits suddenly. “A human kid this time, just because she was playing with some monsters her own age! That little girl’s in the hospital, and we left you all alone after everyone saw us hanging out yesterday!” Oh. Oh no. 

“Is she okay?!” You ask, horrified. Undyne glares. It’s just like you to be worrying about that. 

“She’ll live.” She whispers. “So, like, will you lock your doors, please?” You nod briskly, take a deep breath, then jerk your head at the hallway you’d entered from. 

“Want some coffee?”  
\-----------------------------  
You show Undyne to the kitchen. She marvels the whole way, slowly calming down as she follows you through the house. 

“So, what, are you like, super rich?” You have to scoff at that. 

“I wish. Nah. My parents’ will set up a trust that would pay for the maintenance on this place, and the rest was supposed to go to my legal guardian to take care of me.”

Undyne squints at you. “So, what happened?” You stare at the hardwood again. 

“She, uh, was not a great guardian.” You mutter. “Some people don’t know what to do when they’re given that much responsibility, I guess.” Ugh, that look in her eyes. It’s pity. You slap on a smile. “Anyway, now it’s just me and Ghosty in the party mansion!” You say with false enthusiasm. She rolls her eyes at that, and is about to say something kind, you’re sure, which you’re totally not ready for this early in the morning. Nodding at the coffee maker, you say, “Hey, do you know how to make coffee? I’d better grab my phone and make sure that nobody else starts panicking.” Undyne looks at the complicated device dubiously - your parents had always needed the latest gadgets, but all that technology was more than a decade old now - and nods. You scamper off through the halls to your bedroom, and grab your phone from under the covers.

Seeing all the missed messages and calls, you groan. You quickly sort through Undyne’s, then open Sans’ with trepidation. They start very early this morning. 

-hey pal, just a warning, undyne’s on the warpath right now, maybe give her a call-

-bud? you up yet?-

-heh, hate to be a pain, we’re all just getting a little worried-

*missed call*

-okay. you’re probably asleep still. i’m really sorry. i know we just talked last night, i’m sure you’re fine-

*missed call*

-i know. overkill. the news this morning just has me freaked out-

-is she there yet?-

-c’mon, bud, throw me a bone here-

-it’s been a half hour, she has to be there by now-

-fuck it. i’m coming over.-

That last one arrived while you were still sorting through the rest. You nearly throw the phone across the bed in surprise, then look around in panic at your messy house, your pajamas, your mad scientist hair, your total lack of a bra. Quickly, you snatch it back up. 

-HEY! HEY NO I’M FINE! JUST SLEPT IN! NOT GREAT AT CHECKING MY PHONE!-

-SO SO SO SORRY, SANS! UNDYNE’S HERE NOW!-

There’s a long moment where you stare at the phone, then it lights up again. 

-thank god-

-i’m so sorry. didn’t mean to lose my chill. guess i’m pretty nosy for a dude without a nose, too- Oh, no, he thinks you’re mad at him.

-No! No, it was sweet of you guys to think of me. Especially with such awful news. Undyne’s reading me the riot act for not living in, like, a panic room.- You send quickly.

-well, we all kinda like you, you know?- You can practically hear the relieved laugh in the text. 

-sorry again for being such a pest.-

-i’ll _bug_ you later tonight-

You grin at the phone, then glance up as Undyne walks in your room, balancing two coffees and some cookies she must have found in a cabinet. You can’t imagine being mad that she’s rifled through your stuff when she brings coffee as a peace offering.   
“Here, I figured you really needed this. God, this place is huge!” She plops down cross legged at the foot of the bed and waits patiently as you take a big, appreciative gulp of coffee. 

“MPH! Hot!” You sputter, but it doesn’t stop you from taking another. Undyne tilts her head back and cackles, then innocently asks,

“Who were you texting?”

“Oh, Sans was worried when he didn’t hear from either of us.” You’ve got enough composure to sound casual about this, but not enough to not smile just a little. Undyne’s eyes light up as she grins.

“Seems like that bonehead really likes you.” She says, then takes a sip of coffee. “BLAUGH! Why do humans drink this stuff!”  
*************************************  
Sans slumps against a tree in your yard, looking up through your window and feeling extremely tired and … creepy. It had only taken you twenty seconds or so for you to tell him not to come over.

Of course, he’d been over in ten. He had a very good sense of your soul by now, so it was easy to find a shortcut through space and time between his apartment, and that bright shining point on his radar that represented you. He just had to open his eyes to pinpoint where you should be, and sure enough, there you were, on the other side of the bay window.

And you really were there. You really were fine. You were laughing uproariously with Undyne and sitting on your bed and drinking something out of a mug and probably getting cookie crumbs in your sheets. 

Apart from his first steps out of the underground, it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. 

But then, he wasn’t a part of this happy scene. Undyne hadn’t dithered or put things off, she was never the procrastinator, and she’d gotten there first, and it was stupid! STUPID! that he was feeling at all jealous right now. Time to go home, Sans, before you get even creepier and try to read lips like Frisk. 

His eye flashes, and he steps through a doorway into nothing.  
*****************************************  
Undyne figures out why humans drink coffee later, when the caffeine kicks in. 

“Oh man! Oh, wow, human coffee is really really really great!”

“Really?” You grin.

“REALLY! Okay, so I think we need a gameplan, right?” You’d mentioned that you really needed to shower and clean and run some errands, and Undyne had enlisted herself immediately into these goals. “Okay, go, go, do that shower thing, I’ll pick out cute clothes for you so you look cute for your cute boyfriend so you can be cute together for the rest of your cute lives-”

“Sans isn’t my-”

“-and then I’ll get started on cleaning, and then we can go to the store together and pick out some food and drinks or whatever, and we’ll be all set up by the time Alphys and Paps and Bonehead get here!” You stare at her, agog.

“Jeez, Undyne, it’s your day off too. You don’t need to do all that stuff for me? Like, seriously, we’re not at work, you don’t have to do _anything_ for me.” The look she gives you rivals Ghost’s most weirded out stare. 

“Don’t be such a dweeb, _______! It’s what friends do! And you and me are totally gonna be besties too!” She claps her hands and dives for your closet. You watch her, raising a half hearted hand to stop her, then shrug mentally and head for the bathroom. 

You’ve never had a best friend before.


	8. In Which You Refuse to Wear Hotpants

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ehehehehee  
> your beloved trashperson did some decorating today so this chapter got a lot longer and differenter than I expected  
> you are all very nice people and if I haven't thanked you for all your comments individually, it's only because I'm trying to play it cool as if I somehow don't read and treasure all of them. 
> 
> also I live at totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com if you want to ask me questions/make suggestions/hear complaints about how my apartment is inexplicably totally infested by mosquitos (IT'S DECEMBER, I DON'T DESERVE THIS).

Undyne’s chosen outfit is, uh…

“Come on. I’m not wearing short shorts. It’s the middle of December.” You call from the other side of the bathroom door. 

“Yeah, but it’s pretty warm!”

“Not shorts warm!” You say. “C’mon, find me some long pants, please.” Undyne grumbles, and the sound of her footsteps fades slightly as she heads back to the closet. 

Hey, at least she let you pick out your underwear on your own. 

Finally, you have something more or less wearable. You should have realized that Undyne’s idea of “cute” is a little edgier than yours… and features muscle tanks heavily. Well, once you throw your favorite loose sweater on over that, the boots and tight jeans do look pretty cute. 

“Awesome. It looks like you didn’t try too hard.” Undyne says approvingly. 

“Gee, thanks.” You grumble. “Okay, let’s get cracking on…” Pushing your bedroom door open, you trail off. The piles of clutter in the hallway are gone. Feeling slightly giddy, you walk down to the TV room. It’s similarly immaculate. Barely daring to believe it, you peek your head in the kitchen.  
The counters gleam like you haven’t seen them gleam in years. 

Undyne’s following you closely, watching you anxiously. You catch her by surprise when you grab her around the waist and squeeze her tight. “You really cleaned it all AND picked out my clothes in… twenty minutes?” You say, unable to contain your huge smile. Undyne looks down with a small smile, blushing. 

“‘Course I did, punk. You know me. I get the job done!” After a second, she hugs you back, muttering, “Human coffee helps a lot too…” She hops from one foot to the other when you straighten back up, and says, “Anyway I wanted to get the lame part out of the way so we could do cooking!”

“You like to cook?” You ask, thinking of all the packages of protein bars and microwave dinners she must have seen. Hey, cooking for one was pretty annoying. Everything went bad before you got a chance to use it! And, well, yeah, maybe it was another symptom of living like a hermit.

_Don’t get your hopes up, don’t assume it’s gonna change, they’re gonna leave, people always leave, this isn’t different, why would this be different, you know how to get by on your own, you’ve always gotten by on your own-_

UGH. You cut off that annoying voice in the back of your head, trying to remember that optimism you’d conjured texting with Sans. They all liked you a lot, he’d said. And he’d asked you out! …He hadn’t said the word date, though. Maybe it was a friends hanging out type of event. You wished you had another person to ask about that. In movies, girls called up their moms or their best friends for insight, right? Well, your mom wouldn’t be able to help, and your best friend… you glanced out of the corner of your eyes at Undyne… yeah, you didn’t know if you could handle that much caffeinated smugness just now. 

“HECK YES I LIKE TO COOK! Who do you think taught Papyrus?!” She’s saying indignantly. You consider tactfully reminding her that you haven’t seen Papyrus cook yet. Then you consider the look Sans had given you when Papyrus volunteered to cook in the first place. You decide to stay tactful.

“Well, in that case, let’s get going!” You say, nodding at the correct doorway towards the garage. “Ghosty, be good!” An angry yowl sounds from somewhere in the house; you’re going to be punished for having strangers over later. Undyne stifles a laugh, then follows you. 

\-------------------------------------

She has a blast, of course. She insists on having the roof to your little blue convertible down (“Paps’ gonna flip when he sees this!”) all the way to the grocery store. It’s…. cold, but bracing, you have to admit, and she’s having so much fun with the dials on the radio that you don’t even mind. Shopping is a blur - Undyne tackles a trip to the grocery store the same way that she does, well, everything else. Before you know it, your cart is overflowing with snacks, fruit, fish (“for sushi!”), soda and beer.

“Does Sans really like ketchup?” You ask, raising an eyebrow in the condiment aisle. Undyne nods, smiling slyly at you. 

“Ketchup, hot sauce, barbeque sauce, tartar sauce…” She says. 

“Soy sauce?” You ask, thinking of the sushi. 

“Most sauces.” She agrees. 

“Spaghetti sauce?” You try again.

“OBVIOUSLY.” She looks a little affronted. You look down the aisle, shrug, and grab an industrial sized bottle of ketchup, and after a second’s thought, one of Tabasco as well. Undyne’s smiling annoyingly at you, so you give her your best innocent-as-Papyrus look. 

“Just want to be a good host!” You chirp. She groans. 

“You’re gonna have to tell me what’s up with you guys soon, you know.” She threatens. You glance away.

_Don’t let her in, don’t spill, she’ll use this to hurt you when she goes, she’s going to leave, she’s going to go shesgoingtogothey’reallgonnaleave-_

“He asked me out!” You blurt. Take that, stupid voice. Undyne’s exposed eye goes wide and round and delighted.

“AND?”

“...I said ‘yes?’”

\-------------------------------

You have to read aloud every single text message you've exchanged on the way back; there’s no avoiding it. Undyne insists on driving so you can do it safely. She even puts the convertible top up. This is serious business. She threatens to call Alphys to celebrate how right she was three times in the span of fifteen minutes, and keeps interrupting you to screech at all the good parts. It takes you forever to get through all the ‘greats.’

It’s honestly kind of fun?

When you’re back at your house, she tears around with astonishing enthusiasm, prepping food one minute, arranging the lamps in the television room to look more inviting the next. She makes two more pots of coffee, and you do your charitable duty to drink at least half of a pot - you don’t want her to explode with energy, after all. By the time that everything looks pretty perfect, you still have about two hours or so before everyone else is set to come over. Undyne looks wildly at you.

“Where are your Christmas decorations?” She asks urgently. 

“Uh, in a box in the garage?” Where they’d sat since your parents had passed, to be truthful. 

“Go get ‘em! I’ll be right back!” She’s off and through the back door before you manage to ask where she’s going. You chuckle, and head to the garage, pulling down a large, dusty box from a high shelf. Eeek, it’s awkward. At least there’s light - you’d forgotten to close the garage door when Undyne pulled back in. You juggle the box on your leg for a second, trying to get your grip-

“need a hand?” You gasp, then begin to sneeze as you inhale 12 years of concentrated dust. 

“BROTHER! YOU HAVE BROKEN HER! SHOULD WE TAKE HER TO THE HUMAN VET?” Papyrus appears, deftly picking up the box from your grasp, and revealing Sans. Aw, he was short enough that the box had totally obscured him. You consider teasing him about this, but you’re still a little startled and sneezy. 

“No, Paps, I’m - choo! - fine!” You insist. “Could you help me get that ins-achoo! Inside, though?” Papyrus strikes a heroic pose, then dashes indoors. He’s wearing an enormous backpack, you notice, filled with god knows what. Sans stands patiently next to you waiting for your sneezes to stop. When they do, you glare at him. “You scared me, you sneaky jerk! Honestly, after all that stuff this morning about how I might get attacked in my own house, Sans.” You say reproachfully. His smile fades.

“uh, sorry. guess i didn’t think that one through.” He sounds truly apologetic, so you relent. 

“Well, no big. I’m glad you guys were there, I guess. I don’t know how anyone ever moved that box up there in the first place.” You say. “You guys know you’re like two hours early though, right?” Sans gives you a puzzled look. 

“undyne said you needed a few extra hands putting up christmas stuff so we should hurry over?” He says, reading your face. “guessin’ that was a surprise to you, huh?” You exhale slowly. That sneak. 

“She’s had like two pots of coffee.” You explain sheepishly. Oh, and she’s determined to set you two up. “She’s on a total decorating bender. But hey, the more the merrier!” Sans’ smile grows relieved. 

“you’d tell us if you wanted us to split, right?”

“I promised you that once already.” You point out. “Back at the vet. If I don’t want someone around, I let them know. Besides, I’m glad you’re here! If you don’t mind pitching in, this is gonna be fun!”

Sans smiles up at you. 

“cool.” He holds the garage door open for you, then glances around. “hey, nice digs!” You brace yourself for the barrage of questions, but they don’t come. “where should we start?”

“WOWIE! SANS! HAVE YOU SEEN THIS KITCHEN?!” Papyrus comes tearing down the hall. “OH HELLO HUMAN, HAVE YOU FIXED YOUR NOSE? SANS! THE STOVE HAS EIGHT BURNERS! DO YOU UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH MORE EFFICIENT MY COOKING WOULD BE? WHY DO WE NOT HAVE ONE OF THESE?!”

“heh, doubt the landlord would be open to big renovations, bud.” Sans’ face has that same closed off quality it had back at the vets’, when he was hiding his concern that the vet would turn Lesser Dog away or worse. Before you can say anything, he smiles hugely at his brother. “you wanna help decorate, or get started cooking?”

“NYEH HEH HEH! GOOD JOKE, BROTHER!” Papyrus shrieks, and charges back down the hall, his backpack clinking with the sound of glass jars hitting one another. You give Sans a quick look. 

“don’t worry. he hasn’t burned anything in like two months.” Sans says casually, leading the way through your house like he’s done so a thousand times. You have to grin, nodding to take a left when he finally gets stuck. Papyrus has left the big box of decorations in the TV room (which he seems to have also found remarkably fast). “where’s undyne?” Sans asks, glancing around.

“Beats me. She just hightailed it out of here and didn’t say where she was going.” You say, opening the box. Man, this is dusty! At least it was stored somewhere cool and dry, and apparently no mice had gotten in there. Sans kneels next to you, and you begin taking things out; stockings, lights (there’s no way those still work), bows, your old Christmas books, your big box of ornaments. To your horror, you feel a lump growing in your throat as you look at it all. Just breathe. It’s been so long, now. It would be so silly to break down. Just breathe...

“hey. pal. you okay?” Oh, no, he’s noticed. You duck your head. 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” You mutter. “It’s just been… a long time since I looked at all this stuff.” You keep staring at the four stockings on the ground, labeled “Mom,” “Dad,” ”________” and “Ghost.” What are you going to do with the other two? Sans follows your gaze, and falls still for a long moment. You close your eyes, and focus on your breathing. After a few moments, you feel something cool brush against your neck. You don’t flinch, and you feel Sans begin to rub your back slowly. 

“it sucks. i know how much it sucks.” He mutters. You don’t need to tell the story, apparently, it’s just written on your face, in your posture. “they say it gets better with time, but it just gets… it hurts less frequently.” He sighs. “do you want to pack this stuff back up?” You take a breath. 

“No.” You finally look up. “No, I mean, it’s… nice. I guess I didn’t realize how much I missed all this stuff. I shouldn’t have just left it in the garage to rot… the first year after they were gone, it was just impossible to do this, you know. Literally. I don’t think I could have even reached the box. I mean, I was just a kid, I didn’t know where to get started. And then, I guess we just got in the habit of not doing anything, me and Ghost. I got him some catnip toys and we watched a few movies, but…” You look around at the room, back down at the stuff, then manage a smile. “It’ll be nice to do something new.” Sans keeps his hand on your back, and is just taking the last few decorations out of the box with his free arm when you both hear a soft sound from the doorway and whip your heads around. 

Undyne is standing there, scuffing her shoe against the ground, a huge pine tree slung effortlessly over her shoulder. “I, uh, got you a Christmas tree.” She says quietly, clearly feeling guilty for eavesdropping. You burst out laughing.

“Oh no, Undyne, where on earth… you know what? Don’t tell me. I think it’s probably better if I don’t know.” You giggle. The sight is just too ridiculous, she’s half buried in the branches and you’re pretty sure that it’s one of the lovingly manicured trees from the backyard by the pond. The gardener would probably be heartbroken the next time he came around. You, you thought it looked pretty good in here to be honest. “C’mon, bring it in, we just found the tree stand!” You urge. Undyne beams (you think, there _are_ a lot of branches in the way), and hauls it in, busily setting it up near the crackling fireplace. Sans smiles at you and finally takes his hand away, though not before he manages to squeeze your own hand reassuringly on the way.

(Mhm, confirmed, you definitely like that). 

Decorating, after that, is actually really fun. You think to turn on the TV, searching for a good movie while you work and landing on Elf. Your friends have never seen it before, and they both have to take breaks from decorating to wheeze with laughter and ask you questions about Manhattan. Sans dubiously plugs in the Christmas lights, and, proof of miracles existing, they actually work. Miracle number two, your mom or dad must have saved all of the ornament hooks, because you find a tangled ball of them in a ziplock baggie in the ornament box. You and Sans set to hanging them up (on the low branches) while Undyne winds the top of the tree with lights. After a while, Papyrus comes tearing in with steaming mugs of… phew, not pasta, it’s hot cocoa with whipped cream and star shaped sprinkles.

“Paps! You’re just in time!” You accept your mug. “We need your help getting the star up on the top.” 

“NATURALLY YOU NEED ME FOR THE MOST IMPORTANT PART. FEAR NOT, HUMAN, THE GREAT PAPYRUS HAS DECORATED MANY TREES WITH HIS MANY MANY FRIENDS!” Papyrus crows, then looks uncertainly at Sans.

“just right up on the top, bro.” Sans reassures him. Papyrus very gingerly balances the tree topper on the highest branch. “there you go. nailed it, paps.” 

“I SUPPOSE YOU COULD SAY THAT I AM THE STAR! NYEH!” Papyrus says smugly. Sans just chuckles at him.

“you sure are, bud. you got anything still going in the kitchen?” Papyrus squeaks, and dashes back where he came from. By the time Alphys arrives - the only person to actually ring the doorbell, which Papyrus sprints from the other side of the house to answer - the room looks just like you remembered when you were a kid, and you’re sat down between Sans and Undyne on one of the couches, watching the end of Elf and feeling pretty damn content. Undyne bounces up to tackle Alphys when she sees her, then grins hugely at the rest of you. 

“Now the party can really begin!”


	9. In Which it is Revealed That You Own a Roku (Because Apple TVs Are Too Expensive)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I figured I'd better break this one up into two bits, so I'm giving you the first bit now. I like this one, I'll be real.   
> :3  
> (Alcohol use tw, by the way)

You’re pretty sure this isn’t what most parties are like. Well, then again, you were never really a party person. Sure, you went to your share, but you mostly stuck to the sidelines, because, well, you got invites but it wasn’t really like you were tight with those people. And, yeah... especially in high school, you’d just always felt so much older than your classmates. You didn’t have time to waste on figuring out who was going to kiss whom when you were busy making sure you and Ghost had enough to eat. 

That was not an issue at this gathering. On top of all of the snacks you and Undyne had bought, Alphys had brought over a pizza and a big box of Pocky, Papyrus kept running to the kitchen to pull pasta dishes from the oven (some of them actually looked quite good), and Sans had disappeared somewhere only to return with a tray of mini quiches. You spent a few minutes trying to figure out where he possibly could have put them, then popped the top off a beer and decided not to worry too much. 

All the food and drink was laid out on your mother’s pride and joy, an antique clawfoot banquet table you’d dragged in with Papyrus’ help. Finally, everything in the kitchen was done cooking, and you tossed the Roku remote to Alphys so she could pull up whatever anime she wanted, settling back on the couch and balancing your plate on your knee. This time, you were on the right, Sans was in the middle, and Papyrus was on the left, while Undyne and Alphys shared the loveseat. 

“so we’re doin’ this, huh?” Sans sounded a little skeptical. You shared a commiserating glance with him as Alphys defended herself.

“Ummm…. I mean, I d-don’t know which one everyone would like best…. but anime is really great so I think you’ll like it, Sans!”

“He’s never bothered to hang out with us when we watch it before.” Undyne’s innocent tone was beginning to terrify you. Everytime she used it, it was a harbinger of baaaaad news. Sure enough, she added, “Guess there must have been something special about this time to make him come.” She raised an eyebrow, and took a sip of her beer. 

“guess the stars aligned.” Sans said with a shrug, glancing over his shoulder through the picture window, where the first stars really were just starting to come out. Undyne scowled at him, and Sans gave her a placid smile. Sans’ parka had come off once you got settled in and the fire in the hearth began to really heat the room up - did he get hot? - and he looked at home on your couch, in his black t-shirt and basketball shorts, sipping from a glass of tabasco and pushing a few pretzels around on his plate. 

“Oh! Oh, I’ve a-always wanted to see this one! If…. um, if that’s okay!” Alphys spoke up, her eyes wide as she took in the screen. You glanced back at the TV.

“Of course! Whatever you want, Alphys.” You assured her. “What’s a host club?”

\-------------------------------------------

You found out what a host club was. 

You weren’t sure who loved the show most. Alphys was blushing and giggling basically the entire time. Undyne loved the protagonist so much that she was brought to squeals several times. Papyrus was absolutely enchanted with the idea of a group of chivalrous young men who were so good at first dates they got paid for it. Sans kept snickering and glancing up to check your reaction. 

Even if you hadn’t enjoyed the show, you would have been smiling this wide. God, it felt so _good_ to have people around for once! There hadn’t been this much brightness (metaphorically; you were watching TV, after all) and joy and cheer for so, so long. Not in this house. The only interruption had been the dramatic arrival of Ghost, who finally came out from hiding to storm in, looking imperiously at all of you, trying to figure out how on earth you could think it was acceptable to be in _his_ house. 

“Ghosty, c’mere bud.” You whispered, bending down at the waist wiggling your fingers invitingly. Ghost deigned to come over, the entire time doing his best to appear that he just happened to be heading towards you, and he was planning on going over there anyway, thank you very much. You grinned, and when he got close enough, scooped him up, plopping him on your lap and leaning back against the couch. 

Oh. 

Sans’ arm was there now. 

You narrow your eyes at the skeleton’s cheesy move, and he grins a positively evil grin at you, knowing you well enough by now, surely, to know you’re not going to draw attention to the situation by saying anything. Fine. Fine, Sans. You’re sure you’re as red as a firetruck (or a scarlet macaw), but you decide two can play at that game, snuggle a little closer, and then, feeling his eyes on you, ignore him, instead lavishing attention on the kitty. Ghost begins to rumble with purrs, barely audible over Papyrus’ excited gasps. You smile slowly and scratch under his chin, earning a slightly louder purr. Sans’ skull is still tilted at you, but when you dart a glance at him, he’s no longer smirking, and is instead studying the cat. 

“it looks different out of the cage.” he murmurs. 

“Well, yeah, he would.” You laugh, but quietly. “Come on, I thought you knew all about cats, you made all those jokes at the vet!” 

“heh. i guess i see a lot of them on the internet.” Sans whispers. “they’re funny up close, though.”

“Oh yeah?” You laugh. The import of what he’d just said then dawns on you. You’d thought that all the monsters were totally naive to the human internet; that’s why everyone had come here in the first place. Apparently, that wasn’t actually the case for _every_ monster. He gives you another totally guilt-free smile, and you roll your eyes. It was kind of cute that he’d chosen not to speak up just so he’d have an excuse to come over. And, well, you were beginning to get the sense that wherever he and Paps were living wasn’t exactly suited for entertaining. The thought worried you. 

For once, Sans didn’t notice when your expression clouded over. He was still studying the cat. Very tentatively, he stretched out his free hand so Ghost could examine his fingers. Ghost pushed up a little, craning his neck so he could sniff at the strange new objects. Sans held very still. After almost a minute of examination, Ghost yawned, and butted his head against Sans’ hand, clearly irritated that he wasn’t being pet. Sans jumped slightly, then looked up at you cautiously. 

“Just scratch under his chin, he loves that.” You whisper. Sans looks dubious, but does as advised, running white bones through the soft gray fur. Ghost resumes purring like a motor, and after a minute, shocks you by climbing off your lap and onto Sans’. “Hey, he really likes you!” You whisper. Undyne squeals from the loveseat, and you pray it’s because of something in the show; you don’t dare to look over to see if she notices his bony arm around your shoulders. Sans is frozen still, eying the cat nervously. You reach over and stroke Ghost’s back reassuringly. After a minute, Sans resumes scratching under his chin. You’re not quite sure how it happens, when his hand moves to cover yours, but you rest it there, feeling the smooth bones on your skin and his arm around you. For just now, you’re allowed to enjoy this.

For just now, everybody’s staying exactly where they are.


	10. In Which You Make Some Exceptionally Poor Hair Choices

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As promised, the second half of the crazy long chapter.  
> Man, what on earth would this story look like if the chapter headings were actually what this story was about?  
> Great, is what. 
> 
> My home is totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com and I am giving out really bad homework advice therein. Also I wrote a really great short screenplay there today (cough) and I highly recommend that if any of you are from major hollywood studios, you make it happen. 
> 
> Thank you my darling deers.

It turns out that “everybody’s staying exactly where they are” is literal. Episode after episode slides by, and you start to be thankful that you have the weekend off, because it’s getting pretty damn late. Papyrus nods off first, slumping onto the arm of the sofa. Alphys is next, slowly migrating her head to Undyne’s lap and then beginning to snore quietly. You turn to grin and point this out to Sans, but to your surprise, he’s passed out too, his head tilted back and a relaxed expression on his face. You look at Undyne, and receive several very broad winks and arm gestures from her for your trouble. She’s noticed Sans’ arm. You stick your tongue out from across the room at her, and let your eyes close halfway as the next episode begins to autoplay. Soon, Undyne is asleep too. Hm, maybe you should do the same. 

It’s probably the jillion cups of coffee that won’t let you drift off. It’s certainly not that you’ve forgotten how to relax around people. Right. 

Forty minutes later, you’ve run out of patience, and you can’t just hold still while everybody sleeps any longer. You painstakingly extricate your hand from under Sans’, and slide out of his hold. You brace yourself, but he doesn’t stir. Good. You don’t want to wake any of them. 

On nights like this, you just need to get outside. You don’t feel so trapped when you can see the sky, so panicked when you look over the grounds of this stupid huge house, to the ocean, then the horizon, and remember that the entire world doesn’t rest under the shadow of Mt. Ebott, that you could always just grab Ghost and see what’s out there, that you don’t need to wait to be disappointed, that it’s better to be the one doing the disappointing. 

You grab your coat off the back of a kitchen chair - you’d kind of given up on closets before Undyne cleaned everything up, and old habits die hard - and step outside. The night air is bracing, but unseasonably warm. Probably no white Christmas this year. Oh well. You glance up at the crescent moon, which lights the grounds well enough, and decide to pick your way through the painstakingly manicured back yard and find where Undyne had gotten the tree from. 

Fifteen minutes later, and you’re almost at the rock wall separating the lawn from the beach. You’re also at a loss. Nothing seems to be out of place, but maybe it’s just the dark. Undyne couldn’t just materialize a tree out of nowhere, after all. Deftly hopping the small retaining wall, your feet land on sand with a satisfying thud. You glance around quickly - there’s nothing stopping anyone from wandering down the coastline until they reach your little beach, and you’ve had problems with groups of teenagers or drifters before, but luckily, everything seems deserted. Good. There’s space to think out here. You search for a second, then find a good spot on the sloping, sandy beach, and plop your butt down, leaning back and looking at the sky.

Your mom knew all the constellations, every single one. You remember how she used to take you out here and tell you their stories, trying to explain how each cluster of stars resembled the thing they’d been named after. It’s calming. Orion, there, Aquarius, there, Canis Major, Canis Minor-

“jeez, can you tell a guy before you just up and split?!” You sit upright quickly, sending sand scattering. Sans is looming over you, looking extremely displeased with you. 

“Excuse me?” You say, bristling. “This is _my_ house, Sans. I don’t have to check in with anyone. I don’t _need_ anyone following me around, okay?” You’re not as mad as you sound, just startled and out of sorts. You’ve never taken anyone out here before. This has always just been for you, and you’re feeling alarmed that he’s able to just change the rules. “Where the hell did you come from, anyway!” He glares at you, his eye flashing. 

“i woke up and you had just left us all!” He snaps. “anyone could have seen a whole bunch of monsters show up at your house, and we all let our guard down and you disappeared! god, what was i supposed to think!?”

“I don’t know, that I’m a grown adult that doesn’t need to be watched?! Nothing’s going to happen to me, Sans. I do this all the time. I’ve been getting by just fine on my own for a long, long time. And you can’t keep acting like you guys are a liability to me, okay, plenty of humans are friends with monsters now, it’s not that big of a deal!” You say irritably. 

“i bet that’s exactly what that little girl in the hospital’s parents said.” Sans says blackly. “i bet they wished they’d watched her closer now.” 

“Yeah, well, you know what?!” You’re getting worked up now, but you can’t help it. “You’re not my _parent,_ okay!?” You take a deep breath, then look down at your knees. “That’s not what I want.” You mutter. Sans watches you for a second, and you can hear the sound of breath being drawn in between clenched teeth. Suddenly, he sits down next to you, his head hanging. 

“sorry.” He mutters in return. You let the silence hang for a long, long time. 

“‘s okay.” You finally whisper, not looking at him, looking out at the horizon. He hesitates, then groans and flops onto his back, looking up at the sky. So he’s not going anywhere, then. You consider storming off, but even when you’re caught off kilter, you realize how childish that would be. So, after a while longer, you fall on your back by his side, looking up at the stars. 

“...can you tell me what happened?” He finally asks, sounding like he’s regretting it even as he’s saying it. You know what he’s asking. 

“The roads can get pretty icy up on those cliffs.” You nod across the bay, where the lights at the foot of Mt. Ebott shine all night. “I guess Dad took a turn too fast. I waited up all night for them. The police didn’t even know where to start looking.” You bite your lip. 

“how old were you?” His voice is so much gentler now, it’s almost impossible to believe that it could have held so much anger before. 

“Ten.” You whisper. You can feel his gaze probing you. “How about you?” You can tell, the same way he can tell. You can just recognize from the way he treats you that he’s been down that same road. He scratches his skull.

“it’s a weird story. magic… complicates things.” He whispers. “i’ll tell you sometime, promise, it’s just… it’s hard to wrap my skull around sometimes.” 

You don’t press it. You know the feeling. 

“is it… normal, for humans to leave kids on their own like that?” He asks quietly after another long pause, still looking up at the sky. You let out a low chuckle, and shake your head, getting sand in your hair. 

“No. The will - humans fill out like, a letter thing to say what to do with their stuff when they die - anyway, it said that my aunt should watch me. And, you know, she did for a few months, but she was just twenty-five, she was too young, she didn’t know what she was doing-”

“you were ten, _________.” Sans says darkly. “barely older than frisk.” You sigh, and nod. 

“I’m not saying it was right. It was awful. She’d leave me a stack of my parents’ money, when she remembered it, but that wasn’t always. Less and less often, as the years went on. I guess she got pregnant a while back, and then she stopped leaving money all together. At least by then people would throw me a few bucks for odd jobs. I learned how to make a lot of rice and beans. Macaroni. Learned to fake a lot of signatures. I was hungry too often, and I was always, always lying. I couldn’t invite anyone over, or they’d find out how bad things were. I didn’t have… _any_ friends. ‘cept for Ghosty, anyway. I always thought I’d sell the place as soon as I turned eighteen, move somewhere smaller. I keep telling myself I will.” You mutter. “Then I go into their room, I think I’ll get started boxing things up, and I… don’t.” 

Sans lets out that strange, hissing sigh again, air forced between teeth grit so tightly they almost refuse to let anything past. 

“what did your parents do?” He asks, after the silence grows companionable. 

“Scientists.” You say, trying to make out the individual stars in Orion’s dagger. 

“no kidding.” He laughs quietly at some sort of private joke. “what kind?” You bite your lip. 

“They, uh, worked on the barrier. At Mt. Ebott.” You explain. “Back before we knew exactly what it was. I mean, that’s why we live… lived, so close. They built a device, a… turbine, I guess, that they designed, to draw power from it.”

“you’re kidding me.” His voice is flat with astonishment. You roll on your side to look at him. 

“Hand to god, I swear. Why, is that funny or something?” 

“it’s… hilarious.” He doesn’t look like it is. “what was the machine supposed to do?”

“It powered the whole county.” You say with a laugh. “Mom and Dad made a killing. Hence… you know, the mansion. But I guess that wasn’t the end goal.”

“hm?” He’s giving you that look again, like you’re the most astonishing thing on the entire planet. 

“They were… adventurers, I guess. In like, the old fashioned, Indiana Jones type way. Larger than life. They always needed the next big thing. They thought they were going to be able to draw enough energy from the barrier to knock the damn thing down, eventually.” You say with a laugh. “They wanted to be the first ones through.” He stares at you for a long time, then shakes his head. “What is it?”

“we’ve just got a lot in common.” He mutters, and settles back. “man.” He shakes his head again. The two of you stare up at the sky in silence once more. After a while, when you’re just thinking that he might have fallen asleep again, he speaks up. “you wouldn’t believe what it was like, seeing the stars, after the underground.”

“I can’t imagine.” You mutter. “What did you think, when you saw them at last?”

“it was like… being born. that first week or so… everything was so much better than what i’d imagined. i can’t remember ever seeing the sky meet water like that. or all the stars. underground, we just had these rocks. they glowed. we thought it was close to the same, but it wasn’t. not at all.” Sans whispered. “and you named them all. sometimes humans can be so damn wonderful. you look at the sky and you find shapes and you name the shapes, and you make up stories about them, until they’re not just stars, they’re part of you.” He turns his skull, and looks hopefully at you. “do you know the names?” You give him a small, sleepy smile.

“Some.” You whisper. “Look, that one’s the easiest. It’s called Orion. See the three stars in a row? That’s his belt. And his shoulders are there and there, and his dagger is hanging from his belt…” You list constellations for some time, pointing them out in the sky, your gestures growing less and less energetic. Sans watches you when you stop naming them, and sees the steady rhythm of your chest rising and falling. Fast asleep. 

You don’t stir the whole way back into the house, curled into his arms.


	11. In Which Your Car Gets a New Paint Job

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A great thing happened!  
> patchworkfelicity drew the most shockingly accurate depiction of this fic I could have possibly imagined.   
> LOOK AT THE THING:
> 
> http://patchworkfelicity.tumblr.com/post/135100383864/based-on-the-prompt-by-croxovergoddess-to-draw
> 
> WHAT A GREAT THING.

You’d told everyone before that you sleep like the dead, but you hadn’t realized how true that was, yourself, until the next morning. For once there were no alarms, no caterwauling cat, no guilty realization that there were penguins that needed feeding. You just … slept. It was amazing. Unfortunately, waking up was less so. 

When you peeled your eyes open, you were met with an unsettling sight… a single, yellow eye, inches from your face, staring back at you. You’re about to yelp when the owner of that eye slaps a wet, webbed palm to your mouth. 

Undyne really has to stop doing that. 

After a moment, you nod quickly to show that you won’t talk, and she pulls her hand - and face - away. Only then do you realize your position. You’re snuggled up under a blanket, as usual, but you’re certainly not in bed. Nope, this is the TV room again. And this isn’t your bed underneath you. Nope. That’s a skeleton sitting on a couch still holding you, now balanced on his lap. His snoring is so loud that you’re surprised you didn’t wake up sooner. Seeing how smug Undyne looks, you kind of wish you were still asleep. 

You shoot her a helpless look, and she relents. Way, way too easily, she scoops you out of Sans’ hold. Sans grumbles in his sleep, and tightens his grip on the throw blanket she’s slipped you out of, hugging it tight to his ribs. She smirks even wider at you. You roll your eyes and point at the floor. She pretends not to notice this, and carries you all the way to the kitchen. It’s significantly more embarrassing when Undyne carries you around awake than when Sans apparently does when you’re asleep. You’ve lost your fear of waking Sans and are kicking and complaining about halfway to the kitchen, which only eggs her on.

“Oh, but Sans was holding you like this!” She teases, grinning now, and, to your fury, rocking you like a baby. “And Sans is just your friend, right?! So this must be what friends do! And since I’m your _best_ friend, I should really make sure that your legs don’t get tired-”

“Paps, save me!” You bellow as she hauls you into the kitchen, seeing the tall skeleton behind the stove, wearing your only apron. Papyrus takes one look and jumps into action, abandoning the bacon and pancakes on the stove to somersault over the kitchen island (you grimace, but he sticks the landing) and pluck you from Undyne’s grasp, holding you in her place. She doesn’t even try to hang onto you, too busy laughing at the look on your face as you realize that three of your four houseguests have now held you like a small child. You immediately look for Alphys, dreading the possibility that this nightmare would continue, but she’s merely snickering in the corner, opening a can of cat food for a very friendly Ghost.

“Papyrus?” You say, trying to shift onto your back to see his face better. “You can put me down, bud.” He gawps at you. 

“BUT ARE YOU SAFE FROM THE DANGER?” He asks urgently. 

“As safe as I’m gonna be.” You laugh. “Unless you let Undyne pick me up again.” Undyne jeers at you as Papyrus sets you down. 

“HUMAN, YOU SHOULD BE MUCH MORE CAREFUL!” He urges. “MY BROTHER WAS IN QUITE A PANIC WHEN HE SAW THAT YOU HAD GONE MISSING LAST NIGHT!” Undyne has just crossed over to help Alphys with Ghost, you assume, but her whole body whips around when Papyrus says that. 

“Where did you go?” She asks, not a little threateningly. 

“Jeez, would you guys freak out if I just used the bathroom or something?” You say, suddenly very interested in making sure that Papyrus’ pancakes and bacon don’t burn. “Papyrus, is the leftover pasta in some of these pan-”

“But you didn’t go to the bathroom. So where did you-”

“Oh, Sans! Look, everyone, Sans is up!” Your voice is at least two octaves too high. The sleepy looking skeleton yawns in the doorway, and smiles at everyone. 

“don’t worry, bud.” He addresses Undyne. “i wasn’t gonna let anyone mess with her.”

“I just went outside.” You say petulantly, flipping a pancake. There is definitely leftover pasta in at least half of these. 

Undyne studies Sans seriously for a long moment, then nods. You’re not quite sure what they’ve just communicated with that glance, which ... yep, terrifies you. Papyrus is unsubtly sidling to resume his position in front of the stove until you’re forced to step out of his way. Physically. He just nudges you with his shoulder until your socks slide along the hardwood and you’re suddenly over by the coffee maker. 

(Sans must have taken off your shoes after you fell asleep, you realize). 

You admit when you’re beaten, and you’re worried what Sans and Undyne are hatching, so, after quickly getting a large pot brewing, you wander over to Alphys. She’s stroking Ghost’s back as he eats. The cat needs to take pauses between gulps to purr. “Hey, thanks so much for feeding him. He normally wakes me up as soon as he gets too hungry. And he _never_ lets me touch him while he’s eating!” Alphys smiles widely, then flushes. 

“You j-just looked so happy while you were sleeping.” She stammers, her cheeks bright pink. “I-I didn’t want to… umm… you know, wake you. And Ghost led me right to his food cabinet, so I just…” 

You fight not to blush too when she mentions how happy you looked. This, honestly, has to be the worst development of the past four days, your sudden susceptibility to blushing. Maybe, you think unwillingly, you just didn’t have a reason to blush before. “Well you did great! Ghost clearly loves you for it.” You tell her with a grin. Aw, you can see what Undyne sees in Alphys. Sure, she’s a little awkward and nervous, but… well, you’re in the same boat there! And, more importantly, she is kind to her bones. You can see that now, that deep down all she wants to do is good. Then again, the same could be said for all your new friends. 

Friends. For once, that little voice in your head doesn’t say a goddamn thing. 

“PAPYRUS’ GREAT PANCAKES ARE NOW READY FOR HIS GREAT FRIENDS AND BROTHER!” Papyrus bellows. Undyne jumps up to grab a stack of plates. You notice that last night’s dishes are absent, presumably pleased and put away, and smile to yourself. It’s funny. If someone told you a week ago that you’d be okay with a bunch of monsters rummaging through all your stuff, you’d probably have scoffed. Now, it just seemed like the most natural thing in the world.

You grab a plate, thanking Papyrus profusely, and, remembering Sans, run to the fridge to make sure that there’s extra extra maple syrup, honey and whipped cream. You’re not sure he’ll be interested in the latter two, but it’s worth giving a shot, you figure. He gives you a wide, appreciative smile when you sit back down, and pours himself a big glass of maple syrup, then spears a single strip of bacon on his knife, looking at it half heartedly. 

You manage to snag one of the non-pasta pancakes. Undyne grabs four of the pasta ones, looking at you like you’re crazy. 

“S-so, thanks for… um… letting us all stay here last night.” Alphys stammers, pulling up a chair. “I know it w-wasn’t exactly the plan…” You have to smile at her. 

“Hey, I’ve never had a sleepover party before, I guess.” You say. “It was awesome, really guys.”

“You’re …. sure we didn’t, um, overstay our…” Alphys trails off. Sans sighs, and says,

“don’t you know _________ at all, alph? if she wanted us to go, she’d say so.” Oh, as if you hadn’t had to hammer that through his thick skull last night. The light in his eye sockets is a little too mischievous for your tastes. 

“Hey now, don’t tease Alphys.” You say, giving him your best ‘responsible adult’ look. He grins at you and shrugs. He can’t help it. “He’s right, though.” You add with a guilty laugh. Of course, you just don’t want them to leave, so you’re not quite sure how you’re going to prove it.

Eventually the time comes. You’ve all eaten too much (again), and everyone seems to be lingering at the table, unwilling to leave, occasionally passing little pieces of bacon down to the begging cat. 

“Well, I guess we’d better get out of your hair.” Undyne finally says, frowning a little and straightening up. “But … we could do the dishes first!” She spies the dishwasher. “Oh.” Loading it takes no time at all with five sets of hands to help. You almost have to chuckle, Undyne looks so bummed to leave. 

“You know we’ll hang out again at work tomorrow, right?” You ask with a grin and a raised eyebrow. She rolls her eyes. 

“That’s not the point. Okay, let’s get going, sweetie.” She smiles at Alphys, getting her labcoat from the closet and helping her slip it on. “Bye, loser!” She says, running back to give you a hug. You laugh, and hug Alphys goodbye too, bending down to do so. You watch them walk down the hall, feeling a little sad. 

“probably time for us to go too.” Sans says, suddenly at your elbow. Gah, that’s always unnerving. Papyrus looks at him unhappily. 

“SANS, I AM ENJOYING BEING HERE. IT IS MUCH NICER THAN-” 

“bro.” Sans interrupts, cheeks turning a brilliant shade of blue. “we talked about this.” Oh, no. You stare at Sans, internally imploring him to tell you what’s up. He won’t meet your eyes. “besides, you and frisk have a playdate at tori’s tonight.

“MAYBE THEY COULD COME HERE INSTEAD?”

“papyrus.” Sans says sharply. You clear your throat, but you’re not sure it’s your place to intercede. Sans jerks his head towards the hallway leading to the garage. Sulking, Papyrus nods. 

“FAREWELL, HUMAN. I HAD A VERY WONDERFUL TIME!” You smile at him. 

“Me too, Paps. You’re welcome here whenever!” Papyrus’ skull swivels so fast you can barely track it, an enormously enthusiastic look on his face as he makes sure Sans has heard this. Sans sighs, and gives his brother a small smile.

“we’ll come back, bud, promise.” He says, shrugging his parka back on and digging his hands in his pockets. “later, _______.” He pulls a hand back out, waves quickly, and tugs Papyrus down the hall.

“Oh, uh, later…” Awfully cold shoulder from a guy who had apparently held you on his lap all night, you think, then sigh as you hear the door to the close in the distance. Man. You hadn’t noticed how quiet this place was until everyone left. Ghost meows mournfully at you. “Hey, I thought you didn’t like other people?” You ask the cat. “You miss ‘em already?” Ghost stares up at you. “...yeah, me too, kitty.” You mutter. 

CLANG. That’s the sound of the metal door to the garage being pushed open so fast that the opener didn’t bother to make sure it didn’t hit the wall. You jump up, eyes wide, as Sans comes tearing back in, so fast that it seems like somehow he’s down the hall one second, and by your side the next. 

“stay put.” He pants, looking frantic.

“Hey, what?” You stammer. He says nothing, glancing around. “Hey, what the hell is wrong, Sans?!” Sans is barely paying attention to you, his eyes searching the room, out the windows, desperate. “SANS!” 

Undyne peeks her head around the corner, and looks at you.

“Hey. You’d better come see this.”

\-------------------------------------------

You’d loved that car, you think mournfully. It was the first real thing you’d bought with your own hard earned, legally earned money after you turned sixteen. It had been used even then, of course, and the thing was practically an antique now, but it had been yours.

The vandals had been meticulous and thorough. The soft roof had been slashed to tatters. Something awful and red (you reach to touch it; “Don’t,” Undyne whispers, pulling your hand back) had been poured inside, soaking into the cheap polyester seats. It reeks to high heaven. Your mirrors are all missing. The steering wheel is just, ridiculously, gone. There’s deep gouges all down the body, the work of multiple keys or knives. Each tire is slashed, each headlight ripped out so there’s just wires hanging. The windshield wipers are twisted at crazy angles from the window, which has a spiderweb of cracks running through it. There’s brown shit - and you suspect that’s literal - smeared all over the door handles, and piles of it on the floor of the car. On the hood, two words are painted.   
“Monster Lover.”

You have a flash of brief memory, of being relieved that you accidentally left the garage open yesterday because it gave you light to get the decorations. Now you’re calling yourself twenty different kinds of stupid, feeling the weight of four gazes on you. Your stomach lurches, realizing that if your car got wrecked-

“Are your guys’ cars okay?” You ask quickly. Sans groans softly.

“how is that where your mind goes?” He mutters. 

“They’re fine.” Undyne says sharply. “Not a single little scratch. I guess this is how things go now, huh? They found out what happens when they pick on us, so they’re going for someone their own size.”

“dirty cowards.” Sans growls. He’s furious, more so than you are. You’re still more or less in shock that someone, or someones, could have crept inside your garage, just a few hundred feet away the room where you were all sleeping peacefully, and done this. That they must have watched you, seen where you were vulnerable, and acted so deliberately…

It chills you to the bone.

Papyrus is crouched in the corner, looking very very nervous. He keeps darting glances between you and Sans. Sans is holding stock still, his one eye flashing an unnerving blue. The air is practically crackling around him. You understand now, how he could have cleared out a bar full of human attackers. God, even his teeth look sharper, the black of his eye sockets blacker. “stay here, undyne. keep an eye on her. i’m gonna find them.” He says, way too calmly.

“Sans, no!” You say quickly. 

“they deserve anything that’s coming to them. they think it’s so easy to mess with a person that lives all alone, they think they can gang up and mess with you. they deserve it.” He says lightly, so perfectly casual that goosebumps rise on your skin. 

“You can’t. That’s what they want.” You say quickly. “Don’t you see this is a set up?” 

“S-she’s right, Sans!” Alphys speaks up suddenly. She’s been silent until now, carefully examining the hood of the car, and then all the wheel wells. You wonder what she’s looking for, then shudder to think of what else the vandals might have planted on the car. “They’re trying to make us act. If you find them -”

“i will”

“-t-they’ll be in public, where e-e-everyone can see a monster attacking them. They want you to do it. Th-they want humans to be afraid of us, so they can m-make us go back under!” Alphys is in high dudgeon, her face flushed, quivering with purpose. 

“i. don’t. care.” Sans spits, the calm facade cracking. “i’ve done it before. doing it again. undyne, will you keep an eye on her or not?” Undyne looks uncertainly between Sans and Alphys. Papyrus takes a small, panicked sounding breath. 

“Sans, no.” You say firmly. “I don’t care about this, I don’t care about my car, I’ll put in an insurance claim, call the cops, it’ll be fine. But you can’t do this to Papyrus.” Papyrus lets out a soft whine, horrified to be even mentioned right now. His knees are shaking. ”If they catch you… I don’t know what they’d do to a monster, but I’m betting it’s worse than just sitting in county jail for a while. You can’t leave your brother on his own.” You say, clenching your fists behind your back, ashamed that your voice has begun to shake. Sans stares at you, and you count your heartbeats, waiting and hoping against hope that this will work. Finally, he slumps slightly, the light in his eye fading, and he’s the same guy you met at the vet again, the one who thinks humans are beautiful for finding shapes in the stars. 

“fine. then i’m staying.” There is no room for argument in that tone. Papyrus lets out another soft whine, burying his skull in his hands. 

“If you’re staying, so is Paps.” You say measuredly. You can just tell that if you say no, he’ll set up camp somewhere nearby, and you’d prefer him near you, where you can make sure he doesn’t snap and take down all the redneck assholes within a hundred miles of Mt. Ebott. “We should go to your apartment and pick up whatever you need.” Sans looks reluctantly at you. “Sans, I know you’re worried, but I’m gonna have to be able to leave this place every once in a while. I’ve got work tomorrow. Besides, it’s not like this is safer than anywhere else, clearly.” He shakes his skull slowly, running his fingers over the smooth dome. That probably wasn’t the smartest thing to say. “Okay? Then we can call the cops and the insurance people and whatever.”

Sans takes a long time to think about this, looking around the trashed garage from Alphys to Papyrus to Undyne. They share another long moment of silent communication, and he finally turns to you. 

“ok.” 

You feel like you’ve just prevented World War Three.


	12. In Which You Explain The Rules of Shotgun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kind of a shorter one, because I packed too many ideas into my plan for this chapter so I have to chop it up again.   
> To make up for that, there's been like an INSANE? amount? of fanart that's happened since the last chapter, and I'm going to make you guys look at it!
> 
> Marizzles (who is, in fact, the real Slim Shady) drew Sans and Reader Stargazing (psst look at the shirt!!!)  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135152194891/marizzles-its-i-eminem-here-with-the-sans-and
> 
> Sockbootoo drew Sans hauling Reader's sleepy butt back indoors (and it cute!!!!)
> 
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135158885886/sockbootoo-totalskeletontrash-has-written
> 
> And WHAT THE FUCK PATCHWORKFELICITY, YOU DREW FOUR THINGS SINCE THE LAST CHAPTER AND THEY ALL RULE:  
> Cuddles:  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135159020931/patchworkfelicity-here-just-take-it-flop
> 
> The Vet's Office (all my children are my favorite, sez Trashmom, but LOOK at Lesser Dog here!!!!)  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135162989956/patchworkfelicity-im-still-learning-how-to
> 
> BLAUGH ANGRY GARAGE SANS  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135185738881/patchworkfelicity-there-you-go
> 
> And the BFFS  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135207645001/patchworkfelicity-undyne-swinging-reader-around
> 
>  
> 
> Jeez. I do not deserve such riches. You are all angels. Stop by the tumblr with anything, even if you just want to say hi.
> 
> BONUS SHOUTOUT TO TWO OF YOU:  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135163465701/presenting-my-two-favorite-comments-from-chapter

Once it’s agreed that you’re going to go pick up the boys’ stuff, the tension drains slightly. Papyrus unballs from his panicked crouch, and looks guiltily down at you.   
“Human. You don’t need to let me stay.” You’re astonished for a moment. You didn’t have the faintest idea that Papyrus could speak at a normal volume. Undyne seems similarly shocked, though Alphys looks unsurprised. Sans is staring at his brother, a true look of concern on his face. “Sans is usually wrong about things, nyeh,” he gives a tiny, watery laugh, “but I think he’s right that I should not impose on you, friend.” You shake your head quickly. 

“Papyrus. You’re... so nice to worry about that.” You say. “But I promise, you’re welcome to stay. If Sans thinks that you guys should be here…” You falter and look at Sans, trying to say this right. God, it’s hard. 

You’re feeling like two people in one body; one, the bitter rationalist, is saying you barely know these people, that it’s beyond insane to just let them move in and start dictating what you should or shouldn’t do. There’s a freedom to being on your own, and you’ve always been reluctant to let that go, especially for romantic partners. You can be honest with yourself, you know Sans is interested, when he’s not being angry or looking so worried at least. Your (very) abbreviated history with dating humans has left you anxious, however. Humans always want something from you, and you’re used to having almost nothing to give them. Why should monsters be any different? And, well, it’s always just been you and Ghost. You could, you think, squirming just for thinking it, cut your losses. Get out of here, find a place where your friends don’t attract so many enemies who are willing to use you as a message, all by the simple method of not having friends again. 

But then there’s that other part of you, the one that sounds nothing like that little voice in your head. All this one is saying is that you’re honestly terrified. They were in your house, they’d wrecked something that meant a lot to you, and they were doing it to try and force you into losing your new friends. That wakes up the old defiant drive inside you, the same one that made a ten year old kid figure out how to survive on her own. You’re scared, and you don’t want to be, and you’re furious (though doing a better job of hiding it than Sans). How fucking dare they tell you what your life is supposed to be, who you’re allowed to care for!? Are you really going to let them ruin what feels like the best thing that’s happened in the past twelve years?

You can practically see two timelines spreading out in front of you, based on what you say right now. Either (a): these new friends are always going to be around because they think it’ll protect you, or (b): they’ll leave, because if they can’t protect you, they sure as hell aren’t going to endanger you by drawing attention to you.

You’re selfish, that tiny, angry voice screams, you’re so, so selfish…

But he makes you feel safe. Protected. Cared for. Wanted, not for your stuff or your money (or lack thereof) or even your body, anything like that, wanted just because you’re you. Actually, they all do. It’s been such a short time, already, but you have totally failed your usual method of coping when it came to friendly strangers. You forgot to brace yourself for losing them. In the end, the choice seems obvious. 

“If Sans thinks you guys should be here, I think you should be here. We can all watch out for each other. You can use the whole house, you can have as many rooms as you want, spend as much time in the kitchen, I promise.” Papyrus gives Sans another guilty look

“paps, bud. i’m not gonna leave you.” Sans says quietly. “never ever. i wasn’t gonna, i promise. we stick together, right? and ___________ says she wants you here.”

“I do.” You agree quickly. 

“so we’ll stay here for a while. it’ll be fun. you were just saying how much you like it here, and now your big bro isn’t being a downer anymore, right?” He says, pulling a face. Papyrus straightens and looks down at Sans. 

“I… do not like it when you get like that, Sans.” He says, still very quietly. “It isn’t good. You could hurt someone.” Sans lets out a tired, half crazed laugh.

“s’okay, paps. me and you are gonna be around and make sure that nobody needs to get hurt. i need you, pal. you’re the expert guard, you gotta show me the ropes.”

“IF YOU ARE CERTAIN THAT’S THE CASE.” Papyrus seems buoyed. “WELL, THEN WE   
SHOULD HURRY TO GET ALL MY BATTLE FIGURINES AND MY BOOKS AND MY COMPUTER. AND MY COOLEST SHIRTS.”  
\------------------  
Undyne and Alphys leave, albeit reluctantly. Alphys says they’re coming back, she just needs to hit the university lab to get some stuff she’s been working on. Undyne grins tightly, almost threateningly, at Sans before she gets in her car. “You’d better keep her in one piece, bonehead.” She says. “This is our fault.”

“Undyne, don’t you dare.” You start, glaring at her. “Did you trash my car? No? Then it’s not. Your. Fault.” You say, a little of your impotent rage at the situation lending gravity to these words. Sans moves over to place a restraining hand on your back, the little shit, like he hadn’t been about to commit bigot genocide ten minutes ago. You glance down at his arm, and he quickly removes it. Oh, that hadn’t been exactly the desired result, but… Undyne was looking guiltily at you, and you decide to focus on that. 

“I just wish it hadn’t happened.” She mutters. You nod. You’re pretty sure that’s universal. “You’ll keep your phone on, and with you?”

“Promise.” You sigh. “Guess I’m hitching a ride with you boys, huh?” You manage a smile, and nod at the shiny red convertible, feeling a pang of loss as you look at it. Papyrus nods quickly. 

“YES! SOON YOU WILL SEE HOW WELL THE GREAT PAPYRUS DRIVES!” Gulp. That sounds ominous. All the same, you slide into the back seat, and take a deep breath, waving at Undyne through the window. Papyrus hops in the driver’s seat and Sans hesitates at the side of the car before opening the rear door and sitting next to you. 

“Sans. They’re not gonna be able to hurt me in the back of Papyrus’ car.” You say reasonably. “You can sit shotgun with your brother if you want.”

“shotgun?” The ridges on his skull furrow.

“Oh, um, up front. I guess it’s like a getaway car thing, you know, like the driver drives and the passenger… uses… the shotgun…” You trail off and groan, slumping and resting your head against the window. It was probably indelicate to remind Sans that humans made such a habit of hurting each other that even the front seat of a car was given a violent nickname. “You can’t be thinking too highly of us humans right now, huh?” You mutter. Sans looks at you in surprise. 

“not half as badly as you must be thinking of us.” He says, “well… of me. bro, you know the way to get home?” Papyrus nods eagerly and turns the engine over, driving down your long driveway, through the gate you never, ever bothered to close, and out onto the winding road towards downtown. You barely notice, busy thinking about what Sans had just said. 

“I’m not thinking badly of you. I mean, you scared me a little, but…” A shadow falls over Sans’ face. 

“i know. i try not to use it in front of humans anymore, i just-”

“Not because of the magic! God, nothing like that!” You assure him quickly. “Magic doesn’t freak me out. I mean, I grew up around the stuff. Like, it’s the only reason I have a home. The number of dinner conversations I had to listen to about the barrier as a kid, not to mention the trips out into the field they’d drag me on. And that was the _barrier._ You just had to get like, twenty feet away from it to feel how strong it was. I mean, that was pure, solid magic. I’m sure you’re strong as hell, Sans, but even you weren’t strong enough to take it down on your own.” Sans has to smile at that. 

“yeah, i had to enlist a seven year old to help.” He drawls, but he looks considerably cheered. “so then, what?” He looks over at you, and you groan and flick his shoulder. 

“That you’d get, I don’t know, locked up or something. Or get hurt. Or do something you’d regret later.” You mutter. 

“babe, locking me up isn’t exactly a concern.” Sans drawls confidently. You arch an eyebrow. 

“Well, _babe,_ you still can’t go around mauling every jerk in town, even if they did mess with my car.” You say, trying to impart the seriousness of this. Sans hangs his head, but before he does so, you can swear you see a delighted twinkle in his eye.


	13. In Which You Finally See A Weird Lizard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I told you guys I had too much to fit in the last chapter.  
> c:

Papyrus is driving you through a part of town you’ve never seen before, and the town is just not that big. It reminds you almost of those fake towns in amusement parks, the gaudy gleaming false walls hiding crappy toys and fried food. You don’t know why you keep thinking of that, the neighborhood is a little shoddy looking, maybe, like a lot of these apartment buildings were put up in a rush, but something sets your teeth on edge. It takes you a while to realize what it is: all the windows have sliding metal shutters, and most of the paint looks fresh. Some of it is practically still dripping, gleaming a pristine and insincere white. Nobody paints houses in a coastal town in the middle of December for fun, warm weather or not. Not unless they’re painting over something.

“I’m not the only one to be hit by those guys, am I?” You mutter. Sans sighs and shakes his head. 

“it’s calmed down some.” He says. “i think maybe a few too many of them found trouble. but we can’t stay awake always, and since this is the only developer that’ll rent to us-”

“What?” You say sharply. Sans squints at you. 

“uh, yeah. because they still haven’t decided if housing laws apply to us? asgore’s been in talks for the entire year.” He sighs. “at first it seemed like they were really excited to have us up here. our gold, anyway. paps got his car, right bro?”

“IT WAS THE FIRST THING I BOUGHT HERE!” Papyrus says happily. “I WAS ALLOWED TO TRY OUT ALL OF THEM AT THE CAR STORE, BUT THIS ONE WAS THE MOST LIKE MY BED!” You raise an eyebrow, but can’t help but smile at his enthusiasm, even if this car seems nothing like a bed. Sans grins at his brother, then sighs. 

“but then the banks said that they wouldn’t take our gold. it’s nuts. i worked like, twenty jobs underground-”

“YOU MEAN YOU SLEPT AT TWENTY JOBS, LAZYBONES!” Papyrus cackles. Sans shrugs.

“anyway. had a pretty good nest egg for us. still do. can’t spend it though. i even tried to sell it at one of those jewlery places. guy spat at me. so we had to move out of the house we were renting, and since we didn’t have much human money, we had to find a place that would take our gold. so this … developer guy bought a field and slapped up a thousand apartments practically overnight, just for us monsters, and promised he’d take our cash. think he got a payday from the city, too, since people didn’t like having monster neighbors.” Papyrus stops at one of the indistinguishable white buildings, pulling a neat parallel park off with skill that you certainly lack. It doesn’t look… terrible, you suppose. 

The paint on this one is as dry as a bone, you notice, unbuckling and hopping out onto the street. 

“So, it all worked out?” You ask hopefully, as if asking this will make it true. Sans shakes his head slowly. 

“well. turns out that you can’t build a thousand apartments overnight and do a good job.” He sighs, leading the way up and jiggling the doorknob of the first floor apartment. It opens easily - you figure the lock’s busted.

Actually, everything’s busted. The first thing you notice when you step inside is the odor of mold. You can see it, creeping along the ceiling, ominous and black. Sans looks guiltily at Papyrus. “we tried to get someone in to look at it. the landlord said that we had to have invited a moldsmal over and charged us an extra five hundred that month. asshole. moldsmals don’t even… yeah.” He digs his hands in his pockets. 

“YOUR HOME SMELLS MUCH NICER!” Papyrus says. He’s already scooping handfuls of brightly colored action figures from a shoddy table into a plastic bag. You move over to assist him. Ugh, there’s a pool of standing water on the painted concrete floor. It soaks right through your shoe. 

“sorry! sorry.” Sans says quickly. “forgot to mention that one. it, um, it keeps coming up through the cracks.” You stand there next to the puddle, your eyes sweeping the place. There’s a roach crawling along the wall. You don’t think this is a spider entrepreneur situation. That looks like a good old fashioned surface roach. The door to the single bedroom is open wide enough that you can see there’s just two mattresses on the floor in there, and a pile of books stacked neatly on the ground. In fact, every object in the house is immaculate. They just happen to be located in a slum. 

“Are Alphys and Undyne staying in one of these places too?” You ask. Sans shakes his head. 

“no, alph really lucked out. the university wanted her working there the second she showed up to look at campus. and they have faculty housing. it’s pretty nice.” He assures you. “and the kid lives with tori, you know, the queen, so they have some diplomatic housing deal. still wish i’d made good like grillbz and bought a place while i could have, though.” He sighs. You hesitate, your heart in your throat, then call,

“Hey, Paps, can you pack everything you want up? I just want to speak to Sans outside for a second.” Papyrus nods, humming contentedly. Sans looks at you, askew, but allows himself to be marched out of the front door. “Hey. Stay with me.” You say, the second you’re outside. He looks confused. 

“uh yeah. that’s the plan.” He says, beginning to smile, but you shake your head. 

“No. I mean, tear up the lease, get out of here. You and Papyrus can stay as long as you want. No matter what. You guys can have an entire _wing_ of the house to yourselves. Or the poolhouse, even.”

“...poolhouse?”

“Forget it, I’ll show you later. But pack all your stuff out and stay with me. No more mold, no more broken stuff, no more rent. I know how weird it is, we’ve just met, but this isn’t right. I don’t want you guys to have to live in a place like this. I don’t have much to offer, all things considered, but I’ve got this stupid big house, and it is _empty_ except for me and Ghost and a lot of bad memories. So stay. I mean, leave. Here. And stay with me.” Sans looks pained as you continue, but you have to get it out.

“how did you survive, out here? how did this place not swallow you whole?” He finally whispers. “you can’t just give strangers permission to stay with you, __________. people aren’t all nice. people hurt people like you.”

“I can do whatever the hell I want, Sans.” You say, locking gazes with him and feeling a little like a teenager. “And you’re not going to hurt me. And neither is Papyrus.”

“i’ve hurt humans before.” Sans says flatly. 

“I know.”

“badly.” 

“I got that sense. Stop trying to scare me off.” You say, determined to get this, too, through his head. “I haven’t known you long, but I know you better than that already. You might have done some bad stuff. So have I. But you’re not going to hurt me.” He shuffles his slipper against the cracked concrete stoop, his gaze downcast. 

When he looks back up at you, his eye is glowing blue, and once again, the air around him is crackling. Very slowly, like Ghost stalking a mouse, he steps closer to you. So this is the game then. He’s waiting for you to recoil. You glare at him, frustrated that he’s testing you like this. “I said I wasn’t afraid of magic.” You say, refusing to break eye contact. Ugh, it is doing that thing again, though. Being this close to him, all the fine hairs on your arms are standing up straight, and there’s a twisting (not entirely unpleasant) feeling somewhere in your abdomen. Like being on a rollercoaster, that first drop. He reaches out, and takes both your shoulders in his hands, holding them tightly, and suddenly that giddy feeling is through your entire body. You almost smile, almost begin to laugh, when he leans forward, eliminating the rest of the distance between you, and you feel lips against yours.

Lips? He’s a skeleton. How…

Add that to the list of things you’ll worry about later. 

When he pulls away, you feel like a furnace, and your resolve to stop blushing has been thoroughly wiped from your mind. Luckily, you’re not alone. Even though he’s still just radiating magic, there’s those familiar spots of color on his cheekbones.

He has great cheekbones, you think distractedly, then try not to start laughing, because you’re not sure you’ll be able to stop. 

“you still want us to stay? no matter what?” He echoes your earlier promise. Oh, god, you need to try very hard not to giggle right now, this is so embarrassing, why can’t you react to things like this like a normal person-

“Uh. Duh.”

NOT A NORMAL ANSWER, ________. NOT ONE FOR THE HISTORY BOOKS. 

But it clearly pleases Sans, because his smile finally reaches his eyes again, and he begins to snicker. You can’t hold it in any longer, and you let out a peal of slightly hysterical giggles. Finally, he lets you go.

“can you hang outside here for a few minutes?” He asks you. “i just gotta run this all by paps.” 

Don’t say duh again. Please. 

“Duh-n’t worry about it!” You recover before he can note the slip. “He’s got to be cool with it too, of course. I’ll be right here.” He smiles at you, a big, beaming smile, then slips inside. You slump against the wall, breathing hard. Okay. This was happening. Okay. 

“OF COURSE, YOU MAY ASK ME ANYTHING, BROTHER!” Papyrus’ voice sounds like it’s practically next to you. Well, yeah, the developer wasn’t going to splurge on soundproofing, clearly. 

“LIKE HER? SHE IS VERY GREAT!” You are eavesdropping, you tell yourself firmly, and you need to stop it right now. You will just have to pay attention to that… there’s a weird lizard on the brown patch of grass between the sidewalk and the door. 

You just do not understand the appeal for Lesser Dog.

“I AM NOT JUST SAYING THAT TO MAKE YOU HAPPY, SANS!” Papyrus is practically bellowing. “I LIKE A GREAT MANY THINGS ABOUT HER. SHE IS SO KIND TO ALL OF HER BIRD AND FISH FRIENDS. SHE SHOWED US ALL AROUND HER WORK, AND SHE KNOWS SO MANY THINGS! SHE MAKES VERY BAD JOKES, BUT THEY MAKE YOU LAUGH, SO I LIKE THEM TOO. SHE LIKES MONSTER FOOD. SHE MAKES FRISK HAPPY! SHE HAS A SMALL GRAY CAT I DEARLY WISH TO BE FRIENDS WITH. SHE LET ME USE THE MOST WONDERFUL KITCHEN IN THE WHOLE WORLD! SHE IS BEST FRIENDS WITH UNDYNE, WHO I TRUST VERY MUCH. SHE IS BRAVE, AND GENEROUS, AND SHE THINKS OF OTHERS FIRST. AND, YES, SHE MAKES YOU HAPPY. SO I LIKE HER VERY VERY MUCH.”

So much for getting that blush off your face. 

“YOU MEAN IT?”

“SHE REALLY SAID THAT?”

“WOWIE!” A second later, the door bursts open, even as Papyrus is still yelling “YES I WOULD LIKE TO STAY THERE AND IT WILL BE MY HOME! THANK YOU HUMAN! THANK YOU SANS!” The weird lizard takes off, but you can’t pretend you’re paying attention to it anymore, because Papyrus has tackled you into an absolutely enormous hug, lifting you off your feet. You laugh and finally wiggle until he puts you down. 

“Glad you’re excited, Paps. C’mon, boys, let’s pack the rest of this stuff up. Think we can fit it all in the car?” 

Sans leans back in, looking at the few possessions left in the apartment after Papyrus had gathered up his many action figures.

“uh, i think we’ll make it fit, somehow.”  
\-----------------------------------------  
When you get back to your house, you reiterate that the brothers can set up anywhere in the house that they want. Papyrus runs wildly from room to room, swinging doors open, coughing on dust and exploring. Sans just shrugs.

He picks the room right next to yours.


	14. In Which You Discover That Your Parents Did Not Sell Back Their Textbooks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys rule so hard, honestly. I can't believe how nice everyone's been. I know I usually do the jokes up here, but hey, 14th chapter, let's do a real one. Thank you so much for your support, and your comments, and all the ways you guys have found to tell me that you like this story. Writing it has to be at least twice as much fun as reading it, so I'm getting a great deal here. 
> 
> *clears throat*   
>  UM. NERDS. YOU GOT THAT, NERDS!?
> 
> Okay. Fanart: very important update  
> This is canon now:  
> http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135248413786/patchworkfelicity-undyne-gets-caught-pulling-an
> 
> Please go like and follow patchworkfelicity, who at this point I'm sure is working harder on this fic than I am. 
> 
> ...
> 
> NERDS!

“AND WE HAVE SO MUCH ROOM HERE!” You can hear Papyrus talk, you discover, from about five rooms away. After calling the cops and the insurance people, then getting your new housemates’ limited possessions put away (Sans unpacks in a matter of minutes, Papyrus takes his time claiming a suite of rooms, one for his action figures, another for his rock collection, and the old musty library as his puzzle room), you feel like you need to take a few minutes to just sit down and adjust. So, there’s two guys living with you now. Well, two skeletons. And one of them had kissed you a few hours ago. 

Oh god, had you moved in with your boyfriend of _one day?!_

...Had you just thought of him as your boyfriend?

That is furiously embarrassing. And hugely unlike you, you think, flopping down on the couch and whistling for Ghost. And yet… the corners of your mouth turn up when Sans wanders in, an electrical engineering textbook that must have belonged to one of your parents in his hand. He plops down next to you, sitting crosslegged, and opens the book on his lap, looking intrigued. He seems to know that you just need a few quiet moments right now. Well, as quiet as possible, given Papyrus’s excited phone conversation from one of his rooms. 

“OH, I AM SURE YOU’LL LOVE IT!” Papyrus is saying. There’s a pause, then he cackles. “OF COURSE SANTA WILL BE ABLE TO FIND ME HERE, HUMAN! HONESTLY, WHAT A QUESTION… NYEH HEH HEH…” 

Oh, dear. You’ll need to get the boys Christmas presents, you realize. Well, you have a little extra in your budget… though that should probably go towards a new car fund, you think reluctantly. Sans is smiling faintly as he reads, hearing Papyrus’ excitement. 

You decide it’s not weird, living with him, as long as you don’t think of him as your boyfriend. Just a pal that you kissed, who helped free all the monsters from the underground. 

A thought occurs to you.

“Hey… Sans?” Sans glances up, still smiling. “Is Papyrus talking to Frisk?” Sans snickers. 

“if he’s not, he’s made another human friend i don’t know about.” 

“But… Frisk doesn’t speak, right?” A look of realization crosses Sans’ face. 

“oh. heh. yeah. frisk still has a monster phone.”

“With like a video screen?” You ask, folding your own feet up under you. Sans shakes his head.

“no, no.” He closes the book on his lap, and shifts a little to face you. “i mean, think about it. humans and monsters were separated for hundreds of years. it would be amazing if we were speaking the exact same language after all that time.” You nod cautiously. After all, you have to look up some phrases in Shakespeare’s plays, and that hadn’t been that long ago, all things considered. “monsters can … this is hard to explain. we just get what you’re saying, you know?” You have to laugh at that. 

“Sans, that is just a terrible explanation.” Sans chuckles after a moment, scratching his skull. 

“okay. let me try again.” He thinks for a while. “so, you have a soul.”

“Isn’t that a philosophical-”

“no.” Sans says. You can swear that he’s rolling his eyes, but it doesn’t exactly work the same with those bright lights in his sockets. “you have a soul. period. immutable fact. okay?”

“...Okay.” You grin. 

“and i can see it. and hear it. and i know it. and if i wanted, i could even touch it.” Your brow furrows, trying to wrap your mind around that. 

“Really? Um… what does it look like? My soul?” You’re not one hundred percent certain he’s not just messing with you. Sans’ face grows slightly reverent, as he stares… somehow, _through_ you.

“bright. stubborn. shifting, like a candle flame. not fire colors, though. like the light just above the candle. but saturated with color, really rich? don’t know if there’s a word for that color. don’t know if humans can see it. hm... determined.” He says, then meets your eyes again. “and funny.” He says with a small smile. Oh. You shift slightly, feeling, well, flattered. ‘it’s a very good soul.” He assures you, then shakes his head, remembering what he’d been explaining. “anyway, we can see them, and we can hear them. and we can talk... through them?” He shrugs helplessly. “i didn’t know how to sign when i met the kiddo. i know what a lot of signs mean now, but i don’t really need them. as long as i concentrate, i can hear frisk. and…” He smiles very wide, thinking about something that genuinely makes him happy. “the kiddo can hear us. not with ears, but…” He looks immensely satisfied at that. 

You struggle to imagine what that must have been like. You knew Frisk’s story from the news, of course, you’d placed them almost immediately once you heard their name. Frisk, all alone, bruised from the fall down, hearing a voice for the very first time. You hope it was a nice voice. “That must have been…” You say, trailing off. Sans follows your train of thought, and nods, his smile slipping slightly. 

“hard.” He agreed. “but wonderful too, sometimes, frisk says. poor kid. when most of us met them for the first time, it took us a little while to understand them. we were rusty.” He said. “some of us… weren’t great. some of us decided to take the first swing.” He shifts guiltily. “a little kid, on their own, it must have felt like the whole underground was just trying to kill ‘em. i wouldn’t have blamed the kid, if they decided to swing back.” He says, but he can’t meet your eyes when he says that. Sans is an exceptionally bad liar, sometimes.

“but frisk is special. very special. frisk never … quits. they would just talk and talk and play and listen with the monsters they met, even when they got hurt for their troubles, until it clicked, and they left as friends.” He continues, a little proudly. “i mean, i tried to keep an eye on ‘em, but that kid is everywhere at once, sometimes.” Again, there’s that strange undercurrent to his voice you can’t just figure out. “i’m glad they’re up here, with tori. kid seemed way too old, down below. frisk is a lot more like a kid up here.” He says, unfolding his legs to be able to lean down and scratch Ghost’s back, now that the cat has finally joined you. “cops say anything about when they’re getting here?” You grimace. 

“They said they’ll send some officers over sometime this week.” You say reluctantly. “I guess a trashed car isn’t exactly on the top of their priority list.” Sans looks unsurprised. 

“yeah, figured.” He says, scooping Ghost tentatively up and leaning against the armrest, swinging his legs up onto your lap. You raise an eyebrow. 

“Comfy?” You drawl. He gives you a wicked smile. 

“very.” He picks his book back up, trying to figure out how to juggle both Ghost and the textbook. Ahaha, he definitely has a few things to learn about cats. Just then, Papyrus comes tearing in, his phone clapped to the side of his face. 

“_________, THERE YOU ARE! I HAVE A QUESTION!”

“Go for it, Paps.” You say with a laugh. 

“MAY, MAYBE, FRISK AND TORIEL COME OVER HERE FOR OUR BATTLE PLANS TONIGHT?” He asks, his free hand making a nervous fist. “FRISK WOULD LIKE TO SEE THIS HOUSE, AND I THINK YOU WOULD LIKE TORIEL…” You smile at him. 

“Papyrus, this is your home now, remember? You can invite your friends over whenever you want.” You assure him. “Besides, I want to meet Frisk’s mom too.” The Queen of Monsters. That’s a hell of a title, you think. 

“OH! GOODIE!” Papyrus exclaims, then, wandering into the kitchen, begins to repeat the conversation verbatim for Frisk. Sans smiles up at you. 

“thanks for being so nice to my brother.” He says quietly. You drum your fingers absently on his tibia, smirking back at him when Ghost succeeds at getting between him and the textbook. Good, at least he wasn’t just a little butt to you and polite to all your friends. 

“Your brother is awesome.” You assure him. “I really like him. He cracks me up, but he’s such a nice guy.” Sans nods slowly. 

“he’s too nice for his own good.” He confides. “but that’s okay. i’ll be an asshole for both of us, if it means that he gets to stay so nice.” He settles back down, having managed to inch the cat out of the way of his book, and turns the page, falling silent except to make a small, displeased noise when your hand falls still. You chuckle and resume, eventually just running your fingers over the smooth bone, indulging your curiosity a little. It’s warm, and hard as steel. How could you have felt so comfortable in this bony lap last night? 

After a while, the doorbell rings, and Papyrus dashes past you with puppyish excitement to get the door. Sans peeks over the top of the book at you. “that was really fast.”

“Mhm.” You agree. You should really stand up, you’re expecting… god, royalty, but you feel half melded to the couch. Even with heavy, bony legs on your lap, you can’t remember the last time you’ve felt this comfortable. Well, surely Paps will want to take them on a tour before he brings Frisk and Queen Toriel to see you, right? Sans watches you, and when he sees you’re not in a rush, he hums quietly and resumes reading. You shrug mentally, and pick up your phone, checking for any new messages. You look only away when you just _feel_ a stare boring into you. You glance around, and then grimace when you spot the source of the sensation.

Undyne is standing in the threshold to the TV room. Her exposed eye is almost perfectly round, and her mouth is hanging open in undisguised delight. Sans notices that something has your attention and glances at your face, then follows your gaze to the doorway. 

“oh, hey undyne. we figured you were tori and frisk. alphys’ already done?” He says, perfectly casual. Undyne’s eye grows improbably wider, and with an incredible amount of effort, she finally manages to close her mouth. She clears her throat, and says, in a very strained voice, 

“Oh, hey. _______. Sans. _______ and Sans. I’ll…. be right back.” She clears her throat, then backs up slowly. She doesn’t make it out of hearing range before she lets out a loud, victorious whoop, followed by wild laughter. Sans is looking at you. He looks awfully pleased with himself, you note, trying not to smile. You do your best attempt at a stern look, and wriggle out from under his legs, going to find Undyne. If she gets much more excited, she might break something, you rationalize. And, well, you still have to explain the whole roommates thing. 

She might not break something at that news. She might just… break.


	15. In Which You Begin To Question The Gardener's Sanity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I asked on tumblr if you guys wanted one really long chapter or two shorter chapters and this was the universal answer (from all two of you because it's now very early in the morning ahahah), so here you go. One really long chapter. I hope you're all satisfied with yourselves, you goons.  
> I hope you're sorry.
> 
> ehehehehe.
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr, where U can help shape the story!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> Oh, also someone asked what I thought Ghost looked like, so [here you go I made a thing](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135283320116/how-do-you-imagine-ghost-to-look-like)

“What are you doing in here, you idiot! This isn’t halftime! You get back in there and snuggle!” Undyne says the second she sees your face. You glower at her, knowing that Sans can still hear you, lock arms with her, and escort her pointedly down several halls until you’re definitely out of earshot. She whines the entire way, but when you finally stop (in a very formal sitting room you can’t recall seeing anyone use ever, even when your parents were alive - hey, maybe you can sell some of this furniture to raise car and present funds!) she quickly squeals and tugs you down to sit next to her on a very tasteful floral loveseat. 

“Okay.” She finally breathes. “Okay, I missed a lot. Tell me everything, punk.” She looks so happy right now that you realize you actually are going to tell her, just because it’s nice to make someone’s day, and Undyne has been so good to you. 

“Okay.” You say, sounding a little excited. You’ve seen people do this in movies, of course, but now you’re doing it. You’re giving a play-by-play of what the hot, protective bad boy (What? You did _not_ just have that thought) had done to try to win you over, to your best friend, and you’re both grinning like idiots. 

Of course, in the movies, the best friend had not been played by a totally ripped blue fish woman with an eyepatch, and the love interest had definitely never been a literal magical skeleton. You were entering uncharted waters. “So we got in the car and he called me ‘babe?’” You charge ahead.

“WHAT?”

“Wait, no. We were talking and I said I didn’t want him to get locked up, and he was like,” you drop your voice in a frankly terrible Sans imitation “‘oh, ain’t no walls that can lock this badass up, babe.’”

“WHAT.” Undyne says, not really a question, and begins laughing again. 

“Well, no, not that but something like that.” You correct with a fit of guilty giggles. “Anyway, then we got to their place…” The mood sobers palpably. 

“Yeah. Not… great.” Undyne sighs. 

“Undyne, you’re somewhere safe, right? You and Alphys?” Undyne nods quickly. 

“Yeah, the faculty housing is really great, promise. We’re near the beach, and it’s just a townhouse, but it has a big yard. I mean, not like this place does, but pretty big.” She assures you. “No mold or leaks or rats-”

“They had rats?!” You exclaim. Undyne shudders, nodding. 

“I like rats. I like all animals, you know? But these things… they chewed through everything. Sans saved up to get Paps a TV, so he could watch Mettaton - who is outside your house right now, by the way-”

It’s your turn. “WHAT?” If there’s one monster success story, it’s Mettaton. It seems like he’s been on every channel this past year, first as the perfect guest, now as a host, actor, singer, chef… there seems to be no end to the robot’s skills. 

“He’s helping Alphys put in a security system for you. You know, she made him, so they stay in touch. Shut up, shut up, that’s not important, I was just saying that the rats chewed through all the wires and wrecked the TV so bad even Sans couldn’t fix it. Go back to the story!” She urges. 

“Okay. Okay. Well, I saw what it was like, and how excited Papyrus was to be able to live somewhere else for a while, and I could tell Sans was actually excited for Paps too, so… I um, took Sans outside and asked if he and Paps wanted to live with me? For as long as they wanted?” You say tentatively. She sighs, giving you a knowing look. 

“Aw, I’m sorry, dude. I know, I’ve asked a thousand times, and he just digs his heels in and says that they’ll be fine. I just want them out of there, you know? Maybe if we both ask, next time...”

“Welllllll….” You hang on the word for a second. “So, he, um, he said I was being too nice-”

“Right.”

“And that the world was gonna eat me whole I think?” 

“...okay, new one, but okay.”

“And I said I didn’t care, and I wanted him here.” You flush slightly. “And he just kept saying, you know, ‘blah blah blah i can dunk any human blah i’m a bad guy,’”

“That is really just … an awful Sans voice, ________.”

“And I was just like, stop it, I’m not scared of you? And then his eye went all blue and,” (hot) “kinda smoky and … like he was in the garage earlier. Voice all” (hot) “deep, teeth all” (oh god) “...sharp?” Your face is already heating up, thinking about it. Undyne eyes you, her eyebrow slowly raising. 

“Wow. Wow. You are really _not_ scared by that, are you?” She says devilishly. “Oh, man, this changes so many things. I’ll have to redraw at least three-” She suddenly stops talking. You blink at her. She looks at you, owlish. A long second passes. 

“Undyne…” You begin, then stop and shake your head. If she’s drawing a comic, or, knowing her and Alphys, a manga series about your life… you just don’t want to know about it. “You know what, forget it. Just never mention any drawings ever again. Anyway…” You’ve lost your momentum, and this was going to be your big line. Damn it, you were looking forward to this part!

“________, what’s the matter?” Undyne suddenly scowls. “He didn’t actually … hurt you, did he? I mean -”

“Oh, god, no!” You say quickly. “He kissed me, dude!” There is another palpable pause.

“WHAAAAAAAAATTTT?!” Undyne yells, jumping to her feet. “YES! YES! HECK YES! YOU AND SANS KISSED. YOU DID IT, BUDDY! YOU KISSED A SKELETON! OR, I GUESS, A SKELETON KISSED YOU!” She does a victory dance, as proud as a parent at a college graduation. Then, suddenly, she sits back down, looking politely at you. “So, uh, what was it like?” She asks, as if it’s not that big a deal. You roll your eyes, then grin.

“It was… really good. He is a very good kisser. Undyne, he doesn’t have lips though?! How was he, you know -”

“No, I don’t know, please tell me. In detail.” Undyne says sweetly. You groan, waiting for her to relent, and she sighs. “Sans is better at using magic than anyone I’ve ever met. If he needed lips, I’m sure he just made some. Like, what was his tongue like?” She asks, her eyes lit up, as if asking it casually like that will mean that you don’t notice how nosy she’s being. 

“Okay, (A), rude. We weren’t _making out_ on his front step, you perv.” You laugh. “He just kissed me. It was… sweet. It was honestly the best kiss I’ve ever had. “ Undyne sighs happily, grinning from ear to ear. “And, uh… (B). Just out of curiosity. You think he could make a tongue?” You blurt out. After the delighted shrieks die out once more, Undyne nods quickly and smirks. 

“Don’t worry, sweetie, I’m sure he’ll be able to make _whatever body part you might need,_ ” She purrs. Oh god. You bury your face in your hands and began to giggle, then finally look up again, bright red. 

“ANYWAY.” You say pointedly, “I guess that was just him making his intentions clear-”

“Ahahaha, no shit!” 

“- because he and Paps moved in. For good. He paid the landlord for the last month, put the keys in the mailbox, tore up the lease and, uh, moved into one of the bedrooms.” Undyne’s jaw drops once more. 

“You really got them out?” She whispers. “For good?”

“Um, yup. The owner of the bedroom next to mine is now officially a skeleton with magic powers that, you know, kissed me today.” You say with a slightly proud, slightly embarrassed, altogether … overwhelmed grin. “And I think Paps has moved into … oh, literally every other bedroom by now. He’s having the time of his life. Poor guy, he was so tall and stuck in that little place...” 

Whumph. The air practically is pushed out of your lungs when Undyne, once again, hugs you tight. You’ve been hugged more times in the last few days than you had been in the last twelve years, you think. Undyne doesn’t crackle with energy the same way Sans does, when you’re this close, but when she hugs you, you feel it in your chest all the same, a lovely warm feeling, like caramel, like Ghost sprawled out in a sunbeam, like the smell of something rich and slightly spicy. You don’t think that’s magic, or at least, it’s not the type of magic that the barrier was made of. You think it’s, well, love. When Undyne pulls away, she has an uncharacteristically serious look on her face. 

“If you hadn’t been working at the admissions desk the day I walked into the aquarium… if you hadn’t insisted that I put an application in for something more than being a night guard… god, did we ever luck out, me and my friends, that you happened to be there.” She murmurs. “If I hadn’t had the guts to walk in…” You have to laugh at that. 

“Undyne, if there’s one thing you’re not lacking in, it’s guts.” You point out. “But even if we’d missed each other, I would have still run into Sans in the vet’s office. He would have still asked me for my number. Even if we were on some totally different timeline, I think we still would have ended up friends.” 

“Destiny?” She says, grinning again. 

“Sure, if you want.” You say with a shrug. “Okay, you happy? I want to go see what your girlfriend and Mettaton are doing! Oh man, does he really look like he does on TV?” 

\----------------------

He really does. He and Alphys are standing by the open front door, installing something complicated into the door handle, it looks like. Papyrus is busily drilling a camera into the top of the doorframe, using his height to eliminate the need for a stepladder. It’s small enough to not be easily noticeable. Sans is hanging around, his hands in his pockets, watching the procedure closely. He looks up at the two of you and gives you a slow, lazy smile. Mettaton, on the other hand, bounds forward as soon as he sees you. 

“Undyne! You’ve returned. Oh, and could this be the lovely ________ I’ve heard so much about?” His eyes move slowly over you, his smile growing ever wider as you give a quiet laugh and wave. 

“Uh, hi! Wow, thank you so much for coming out to help! Gosh, I didn’t ever dream that I’d be meeting _you_ today.” You say, feeling a little starstruck. Mettaton’s eyes light up. 

“Oh… my!’ He breathes, abandoning Alphys entirely for the time being. “Alphys didn’t mention that you were a fan!”

“Oh, I really, really am. Since day one!” You enthuse, beaming at the familiar face. You had no idea that your friends were this close with the famous robot. “When you went on that dancing show and did that tango, and the whole internet absolutely lost it over your shoes?”

“Armani, darling, I had them custom fit. Alphys designed brand new feet that night specifically for those shoes!” He says, brushing his hand through his gleaming, inky hair. 

“Alphys, that’s incredible!” You call. 

“Uh, o-oh, it was uh… Sans, c-can you hold this wire please?” She asks, nodding at the piece Mettaton had been working on. She’s sweating slightly, lost in concentration, too focused to be distracted by talk of dancing. Undyne’s watching her, seemingly also lost in concentration. Her sharp teeth are tugging slightly at her bottom lip. 

You don’t notice how Sans’ smile is beginning to slip as he peels himself off the wall to sub in for the robot. You’re too busy having fun. 

“Oh, but then! You and Napstablook, right? That’s their name? That set on SNL is already legend. You’re both so great!” You say. “I listened to your live album like, a billion times, look.” You begin to fish out your phone to show him the play count on the album, then groan. “Oh, I’m being such a suck up, aren’t I? I’m sure you just wanted to have a normal day -”

“Oh, NO, DARLING!” Mettaton purrs, the bass in his projected voice rumbling through you. “They all said you were wonderful, but I simply didn’t know such an absolutely gorgeous creature could have so many different interests!” Ahhahaha, oh, oh, wow. Mettaton, from TV, had just called you absolutely gorgeous. Mark that one away in the memory book!

“Are you kidding?” You say excitedly. “Look who’s talking! You can sing, you can dance, and you cook, too?” 

“You enjoy my cooking program?” Mettaton says, sounding absolutely delighted. 

“Of course I do! God, when you went toe to toe with Gordon Ramsay, and you pulled off that _salmon en croute_ with the fresh herb sauce you cooked inside the whole lemon, and you cut open the lemon tableside and nobody could figure out how you did it? Oh, oh, and don’t tell me, I can remember, the truffle studded terrine… and that flower that melted and then formed itself into a chocolate mousse in the shape of a different flower. I always wanted to make something that looked as beautiful as that.” You sigh wistfully. Mettaton sighs too, in absolute bliss. 

“Step into the light, darling, let me take a closer look at you.” He says quietly. You blink, but oblige, stepping into a sunny patch of the front yard - it’s still positively balmy for December. 

“Is this good?” You ask dubiously. 

“Delightful.” Mettaton murmurs. You have to grin at him. He always talks to the camera as if he’s trying to seduce it. Apparently, this is not an affectation for the screen. He walks a broad circle around you, making soft, appreciative noises. “Charming figure. Entirely charming.” He pronounces, and ‘tsk’s at you when you begin to demur. “Gorgeoussss hair.” He continues. “Goodness, you just want to bury your face in it, don’t you boys!” He calls to Papyrus and Sans. 

“NO!” Papyrus calls back cheerfully. Sans makes an awfully strained noise that isn’t an answer. You glance over at him, but Mettaton demands your attention back at once. 

“Such big, bright eyes. Adorable nose.” He leans forward and boops it with the tip of his finger, and you struggle not to giggle. “Such an expressive mouth, too. Do you ever wear lipstick, darling, I can recommend several brands that would just make those luscious lips *pop!*” He says, letting out a rich, fluid chuckle, his finger now tracing your cheekbone. “What do you say, sweet, would you like to go to L.A., maybe Tokyo, say a few weeks from now when this all blows over? I’ll help you get your big start!” You blink at him, then begin to laugh. 

“Oh, wow, Mettaton, that’s an… amazing offer. Thank you so much, but I think I’ll have to pass. I’m really, really happy here.” You say, and with a pang, realize that it’s true. “I’ve got an amazing job here, and I don’t think I can jeopardize my plans to be the head honcho at the aquarium in fifteen years if I run off and chase the spotlight.” You say with a grin. Mettaton pouts. 

“You’re certain?” He says, removing his hand from your face. “You’ve got something there, I know it. I can just see it in some people.”

“she sounds pretty certain, bud.” Sans has wandered over, looking a strange mixture of agitated and relieved. “________ knows what she wants.” Standing next to you, he unsubtly threads the cool bones of his fingers through your own, squeezing your hand. You glance over at him, and then understand. Oh lord. Your sweet, stupid bonehead here was practically dripping jealousy.

Well, quickly replaying the last few minutes in your head, you realize that he’s at least a little justified. Mettaton is looking at your linked hands with undisguised interest. “Oh… goodness.” He purrs. “I didn’t know the two of you were such _good_ friends already!” Sans glares up at him, but well, what’s he going to say? You’re not officially dating. You haven’t even been on the date he’d asked you on in the first place. You’ve basically just moved in together and kissed on a stoop. Looking at your numbskull again - yes, YOUR numbskull, your heart says firmly - you decide to be as clear as possible. 

“Well, we _are_ going out on that date tomorrow night after work, right, Sans?” Sans looks back at you, suddenly wearing a smug grin. 

“that’s right.” He confirms. Mettaton pouts once more, as if you’d just delivered absolutely terrible news. The hammy acting makes you want to giggle again, but you manage to restrain it. “speaking of which,” Sans continues, “can I speak to you privately for a second, babe? maybe over there?” He nods at a honestly kind of tacky topiary arrangement in the front yard, easily out of earshot from the others. Huh.

“Uh ... sure, Sans.” You say. Mettaton locks eyes with Sans, a tiny smile back on his face now. “She didn’t call you ‘babe’” is what that expression is silently saying, and you feel a little annoyed that Mettaton seems to be teasing your…. well, your Sans. So you release his hand to wind your arm around his back as you walk over to the designated spot, then tilt your head, looking at him. “So did you just want to look at these bushes shaped like… two swans and a velociraptor?” You say, managing to distracted by the topiary animals now that you’re closer. “Wow, if that’s supposed to be a swan, it’s really bad-”

“hey.” He cuts you off. “i just wanted to say, you know, i don’t want you to feel like you’re stuck with me, this thing, whatever’s happening with us right now. i, uh, i kissed you back there because i needed you to know how i felt about you... before you were sure about taking us in.” He sighed. “but i don’t want you to feel like we have to be more than friends just because me and my bro are staying with you. not if you don’t want to. i mean, look, i know we’re a bad match.” Oh, wow, that kind of stung. 

“How are we-” You start, but Sans shakes his head. 

“i mean, not that you’re a human and i’m a monster.” He says. “but we both know that you could have any human or monster you want, no problem.” You snort. 

“Oh, sure, we both know that.” You drawl sarcastically. He forges on ahead, ignoring you.

“i’m nothing like mettaton. i can’t take you the same places or show you the same things. even humans love a guy like him, but i’m not him. i’m not always easy or fun, i come with so much baggage, and you, you’re just… gorgeous and smart and you’ve got this beautiful soul and I’m just dust in compar-”

You can’t stand to hear him talk about himself that way. Sure, he has flaws, but so do you. He just can’t understand the admiration, and affection you have for him already. Not to mention the worry, and the fear for him, and, well, a gut attraction. It’s the latter that you act on, leaning forward and kissing him again, very softly. Your lips hit bone and teeth, not soft, clever lips, but you don’t let that distract you. 

(“GET SOME!” Undyne’s voice carries over to you without the slightest difficulty.)

You part about an inch from him, studying the light in his eyes. He makes a very quiet, very low noise, and brightens from the inside, that eye snapping blue again. You shiver pleasantly as he closes the distance between you two once more, kissing you a bit more hungrily than he had earlier in the day.

(“SANS, PLEASE STOP, YOU'RE EMBARRASSING ME!” Papyrus cackles. “OWIE! UNDYNE, NO HITTING!”) You have to pull away first, the enormity of all the changes of the day coupled with Papyrus’ antics making you realize that you’re in your front yard, kissing a skeleton in front of all of your new friends, your new roommate, and a TV star. Oh, and the Queen of Monsters will be arriving any minute. You clear your throat, and manage to speak up this time. 

“I like watching Mettaton on TV, you dork! That’s all! He’d drive me nuts in about an hour if I had to go anywhere with him.” You smile at him slowly. “Look, my dating history is basically a series of me messing stuff up or giving up after a few dates. I’m really bad at, you know, relationships. As in… I’ve never really had a real one.” You frown slightly. “I know this, though. I’ve never felt it before, the way I feel when I’m with you.” You admit. “This is new for me, the feeling of… actually wanting to be with someone, I guess?” You say, feeling the back of your neck burning. 

“mmm, so you do _want_ me?” He repeats, suddenly giving you a very toothy grin, all smugness and satisfaction. You wonder how much of that is an act, how much of it is done to make you smile or roll your eyes or laugh. Naturally, it works

“Ha, nice try, you jerk.” You laugh, still flushing. “I’m just saying. You’ll take me out tomorrow night, and we’ll… start from there, I guess?” 

“uh, babe, I think we already started.” He points out. 

Well, you can’t exactly argue with that.


	16. In Which Mettaton Knows A Lot About Georgian Cabinetry

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A pretty damn fluffy chapter today, since I wrote one yesterday and it just refused to work one bit. Well, actually, it was just a lot of Mettaton messing with Sans, and it wasn't going anywhere - I'm going to polish that up and give it to you guys as a oneshot, promise. In the meantime, enjoy ONLY _SOME_ JEALOUS ARGUING
> 
> P.S.
> 
>  
> 
> [LOOK AT SMOOCHY CHAPTER 15 SANS](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135342045631/iambisansexual-here-is-the-fanart-i-promised)

Once the security system was installed in the doors, the cameras (both hidden and obvious) were the next step. Alphys had you guide the small group from room to room inside, planting the motion detecting cameras where they’d be able to pick up the most activity from the windows. Honestly, Alphys was doing the lion’s share of the work. Undyne was busy gloating over you and Sans still, Mettaton was still flirting heavily, and Papyrus had given up entirely, waiting at the front door for Frisk and Toriel like a puppy. You nod at the cameras. “So, what happens when they see someone who’s not supposed to be there?” You ask. Alphys grins proudly. 

“Th-they give the trespassers ten seconds to clear out.” Alphys says. “It plays a recording, um... telling them to get out o-or the defenses engage.”

“Defenses?” You ask. Mettaton smiles widely. 

“Lasers, darling.” He coos. “They work very nicely. They’re set to stun any enemies. And if they don’t work, well, you can always call your dear friend Mettaton, and he’ll be there in a flash to rescue you!” He gives you a broad wink. Oh, you know what he’s doing - his eyes move almost imperceptibly to Sans. 

“won’t be necessary.” Sans can’t help but take the bait. “i’ll be here.” He locks eyes with the robot, and pronounces, very clearly, “every. single. night.” Then he glances at you, with almost infuriating confidence.

“Guys.” You sigh. “Mettaton, I know you live for this stuff, but there’s no need for drama right now, okay? I’ve had a pretty tough day. And Sans…” You trail off and sigh. What, like you’re going to lecture him for saying he’ll be there for you in case of danger? Still, you’re pretty sure that Sans had been hammering across a little more than that, the way he had been looking at Mettaton. You’re not a fan of being talked about like you’re some valuable commodity. “You guys just be nice.” You finally sigh. 

“Oh, darling, I am so so so sorry!” Mettaton cries. “I never meant to distress you, and with the just awful day you’ve had, oh I just feel terrible! Come here, precious!” He wraps his cold metal arms around you, pressing your face against the smooth chassis of his chest. “What kind of star of screen (and stage) would I be if I failed to comfort my number one fan properly!?” You have to laugh, thinking of the utter ridiculousness of the situation. He begins to stroke your hair comfortingly. “There there, pet. It will all be fine.”

In this position, Mettaton knows that you can’t see anything more than the polished curve of his chestplate, so he has absolutely no problem in giving Sans a wide, predatory smile. Sans glares absolute black fury at the robot, but by the time you manage to get away from the hug, he’s got a placid smile on his face.

Undyne, on the other hand, is barely paying attention to the installation, watching this all with delight.

“Hey, ___________, do you have any bags of popcorn downstairs?” She asks in a high pitched voice. You look at her, mystified. 

“Uh, I don’t think so, dude. Why?” When Undyne only gives you an innocent smile, you think you’ve figured it out. “Oh, god, we totally missed lunch, and it’s practically dinner time already. I’m so sorry. You’ve gotta be starving.” You sigh, then blink. “Oh no. Oh, god, the queen is coming here and it’s dinner time.” You take a deep breath, trying to figure out what you need to do. “Does she eat pizza? We’ve got leftovers… oh, god, I’d better get more.” Undyne sighs, and straightens up from her crouch next to a handful of wires. 

“Sweetie, I’m going to help __________ with dinner.” She tells Alphys, who has practically retreated into the conversation, too fixated on, well, whatever it is she’s doing with those wires. 

“Mhm, fine, okay.” She says distractedly, sparing a glance over and only looking at Undyne when she swoops to kiss the dinosaur’s cheek. “Sans, can you get me the, you know… the round thing? Mettaton, I need those lenses. No, the big one first.” It’s funny. In this context, she doesn’t stammer at all. She’s in perfect control of the tiny system she’s creating. It’s lovely to see. You grin at Undyne, then look at both Mettaton and Sans. 

“Play. Nice.” You instruct firmly, and they both look at you like schoolboys who’ve been caught fighting. 

They do have the good sense to stop arguing until you’re out of earshot. 

\---------------------

You nearly walk past Papyrus, who is pacing anxiously at the door in the front hall. “Hey, Paps, that’s not going to make them come any faster.” You tease him. 

“I KNOW. I AM JUST IMPATIENT.” He says, awfully reasonably. “FRISK IS SO EXCITED TO SEE YOUR HOME!”

“Our home.” You remind him. “C’mon, bud, you moved in all your stuff. Alphys gave you that brand new key to the fancy new locks and everything too! It’s official!” You can’t have him thinking that he ever needs to go back to that awful slum. 

“MY HOME.” Papyrus corrects himself, and smiles at you. “OH, HUMAN. I’M VERY LUCKY TO HAVE IMPRESSED YOU SO MUCH THAT YOU FEEL YOU NEED TO HAVE ME AROUND.” He says happily, then leans in close, as if he’s going to whisper to you. “HOWEVER, YOU DON’T NEED TO KISS SANS TO KEEP ME HERE, I’M HAPPY TO STAY. I KNOW IT MUST BE AWFUL FOR YOU.” 

Dear god, that was in no way a whisper. “Paps, my ears!” You whimper, trying to ignore Undyne’s raucous laughter. You feel like you _do_ need to address this. You’ve suddenly inserted yourself into this family, and in spite of his huge size, you know that in many ways, Papyrus is quite young. You want to make sure that he’s okay with all the changes. “Don’t worry, Papyrus.” You say, when the ringing in your ear stops (and the distressed skeleton stops trying to pet your ear to make it feel better.) “Your brother and I, um…”

“ARE YOU DATING?” Papyrus asks excitedly. “I KNOW ALL ABOUT DATING, I CAN GIVE YOU TIPS. HAVE YOU MADE THE SPAGHETTI YET?” 

“Uh…” You look to Undyne for help, and are unsurprised by the obnoxious grin she gives you. Okay, no help from that valuable resource. “Not just yet, Paps. Your brother’s gonna take me out tomorrow night, though, if that’s okay.” Well, you’d just sort of pulled “tomorrow” out of thin air when you were talking with Mettaton outside, but it had seemed that Sans was happy about it. 

“OH, GOOD! I DO NEED SOME TIME TO WORK ON MY TRAINING, AND UNDYNE CAN COME OVER HERE THEN, ESPECIALLY SINCE SANS WILL BE OUT FROM UNDER OUR NOSES!” You squint at Undyne, and mouth the word ‘training?’ She gives you a helpless shrug.

“Sounds like a plan, Paps.” She says, grinning up at the skeleton. You clear your throat.

“But, uh, you’re okay with all that?” Papyrus does his best evil smile. 

“NYEH HEH HEH HEH. IF SANS HAS TO GO ON A DATE WITH ANYONE, I AM GLAD IT IS YOU, HUMAN. WHEN HE IS HAPPY, HIS JOKES IMPROVE SLIGHTLY.” Well, that’s probably as good as you’re going to get from Papyrus. 

Just then, the front doorbell finally rings, and Papyrus (who has been waiting for this moment) flings the door open. There, in the doorway is Frisk, who immediately runs headlong to tackle Papyrus in a hug. 

There is also an eight foot tall white goat...woman, her arms full with bags and boxes that are letting out a wonderful smell. She’s got a big smudge of flour on the front of her purple sweater, and she is looking on the ground in confusion. You realize that an apple has fallen from one of the bags and, not really thinking about it, dart down to grab it for her. She gives you a relieved look when she sees you pop up with it.

“Oh, thank you! I do hope you haven’t all eaten yet!” She says. Oh, her voice is just beautiful. Undyne bounces over to grab the supply of food out of Toriel’s arms. 

“No way, majesty, this is awesome!” She says excitedly. “Oh, man, is that snail pie!? _______, I’m gonna bring this into that room with the big table!” She tears off, leaving you in the foyer with the queen while Papyrus and Frisk chatter. 

“Just a tiny one.” The queen says, almost guiltily, then looks back at you. “Oh, goodness, we haven’t even actually met yet, have we?” She reaches out and takes your hand, clasping it between her own. You feel tiny, suddenly. “I am Toriel. I’ve heard so much about you from Frisk in the last few days that I feel like we’re already close friends!” She says, giving you a lovely, shy smile.

“Oh! HI!” You stammer, then take a deep breath. “I’m so sorry, I’ve just never met royalty before.” And you’re still trying to come to terms with everything else, like the fact that your favorite actor is upstairs, probably arguing with your boyfriend (oof, there that title was again), or that your best friend was comfortable enough with your house to know that the dining room could fit all of you without even asking. Toriel shakes her head. 

“Please, don’t worry! Pretend you’ve never heard about that foolish title!” She begs. “Please just think of me as Frisk’s mom.” You hesitate, then nod quickly. You can do that. 

“Well, I’m so happy you’re both here! Ah!” Frisk has finally separated enough from Papyrus to tackle you in a hug too. “Hey squirt!” You laugh, making sure their face is turned up so they can see you.

“Frisk! Manners! We don’t just jump on our new friends, do we?” Toriel says, flushing. Frisk hesitates, then smiles obnoxiously wide and nods that yes, we do just jump on our new friends. Toriel looks sternly at her child. Frisk sighs, and runs their closed fist in a circle in front of their chest, mouthing ‘sorry.’ You have to laugh. Oh, you wish you knew more signs! You’d have to sign up for an online class tonight. The kid hops back and begins signing quickly. Toriel smiles. 

“Much better.” She tells Frisk. “Frisk would like to thank you for inviting us into your house, and to say how grateful they are that you’ve invited Uncle Papyrus and Uncle Sans to live with you here as well. They say that your house is beautiful and that… they’re sorry that you’ve had trouble with mean humans too.” Frisk continues to sign, and Toriel looks shocked. “Frisk! You will most certainly _not_ beat anyone up!” She admonishes. You giggle, and ruffle Frisk’s hair. 

“Thanks for the thought, little dude.” You say, then smile back at Toriel, who is shifting slightly. 

“I, too, have to say how grateful I am.” She begins. “Sans would always make sure that we met up at my new home, and I know what the monster residences are like, around here.” You shake your head. 

“Well, Sans wanted to stay and make sure that those vandals didn’t come back anyway. I just gave them the extra kick out the door.” You say. “Hey, Paps, why don’t you show Frisk all your new rooms!” Papyrus practically glows at the suggestion, and he grabs Frisk’s hand, calling out,

“WHAT A WONDERFUL IDEA!” as he tugs Frisk deeper into the house. Frisk lets out a wild burst of laughter as they’re pulled along. Toriel smiles fondly behind them, then looks back at you. 

“Oh, gosh, where are my manners. Can I get you something to drink? Oh, and you brought all that food for dinner, too!” You say, suddenly feeling quite rude. Toriel seems to care a little more than you do about propriety. 

“Oh, some of it needs to warm in the oven if you don’t mind. I would love a cup of tea while everything heats up, though…” She says shyly. 

“A-all finished!” Alphys calls from the top of the stairs, and proceeds down them, looking tired. 

“Your first line of defense is firmly in place, darling.” Mettaton and Sans appear around the corner after her. “Oh, hello, your majesty!” 

“hey tori.” Sans says tightly, and seems to have to work very hard not to jostle Mettaton all the way down the stairs. When he reaches the bottom where you’re standing, he immediately wraps his arm around your waist, leaning slightly against you. Toriel takes this all in, her smile growing warmer. 

Good. So is your face. 

“C’mon, guys, I was just going to make Toriel some tea. She was kind enough to bring dinner for us all!” You say, smiling at your friends. “Why don’t we all go in the kitchen and get drinks while I warm the food up. Thanks so much for all your hard work, by the way. It just means… so, like, crazy much to me.”

“I-it was fun!” Alphys says immediately. 

“Anything for you, beautiful.” Mettaton sighs happily. Sans’ hold on you grows a tiny bit tighter, but he smiles at you all the same. 

“anything i can do for you, i’ll do.” He says seriously, and you can tell he means it. Oh. 

“Thanks.” You murmur, and then laugh. “Come on, guys, let’s go to the kitchen. I never even use this hall. Papyrus! Frisk!” You call.

“IN A MINUTE, HUMAN, FRISK HASN’T SEEN MY PUZZLETORIUM YET!” Papyrus calls back impatiently. You roll your eyes, wondering how this suddenly became normal, and led the way. Sans releases your waist, but only to twist his fingers back through yours.

“You weren’t too mean to Mettaton, were you?” You whisper under your breath. “I like him!”

“i know you do. that’s why he’s not a scrap pile right now.” Sans grumbles. You try not to find this at all funny, and fail. 

“Well, I’m sure he had a good time torturing you.” You sigh, still laughing. “But you really need to relax. There’s only one monster out there for me right now.”

“yeah?” You turn to give him a stern look - you were admiring the one Toriel had used on Frisk so much that you wanted to perfect your own - but he’s looking so happily at you that you forget to narrow your eyes. 

“Uh, yeah, bonehead.” You say, grinning at him. He stays silent for a moment, walking by your side (and listening to the running narration of Mettaton, fifteen feet behind you, who was explaining the artistic merit of the architecture, paintings, and furniture as he passed them to anyone who would listen.)

“great.” He finally says, looking over at you again. 

Great.


	17. In Which Mettaton Speaks French

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahahah seventeen chapters wow.  
> what is wrong with me.  
> what is wrong with all of us.  
> thanks for reading, you maniacs.
> 
> P.S.
> 
>  
> 
> [SLOTHFRISK RIDES AGAIN](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135414498916/selzziram-hey-i-havent-really-drawn-paps)

Dinner was wonderful. Well, nearly. Mettaton was still needling Sans whenever he got half a chance, which was beginning to get a little draining. Slowly, though, perhaps realizing that you weren’t laughing so much (or maybe that Sans just wasn’t rising to the bait so often when he was seated next to you at the table, his knee pressed against yours), the robot gave up, reluctantly, and instead began grilling you on all the antiques in the house. 

“But surely, darling, you must know the _provenance_ of this beautiful _étagère_.” He insisted. You blinked at him. 

“Uh. The bookcase? It’s old.” You supplied. The conversation repeated with various objects all throughout dinner. Maybe Sans was laughing a little hard at the way you just clearly weren’t interested in all the fascinating pieces of furniture. You considered admonishing him, but, well, he just gave you that genuine smile every time he’d pushed you too far. 

You were starting to consider that perhaps the smile was not, in fact, genuine. It might have been simply calculated to make you melt. Damn him for making it work. And, well, Mettaton had been rough on him, so you supposed if he felt a little better that it turned out you didn’t have much in common with the gleaming robot, that was fine. 

The only other thing that made you feel a little uncomfortable (other than Undyne waving a slice of snail pie obnoxiously under your nose) was, surprisingly, Toriel. Or more specifically, Toriel and Sans. They were clearly much closer friends than you’d been told, and they had no problem rattling off inside jokes, or puns, or worst, inside puns, at each other. It wasn’t that you were at all jealous; you’d told yourself that several times, so obviously, obviously you weren’t. Right. It was just that he looked so easy and at home with her. And she was, well, not you. She was elegant, refined, motherly, beautiful, talented at cooking and baking. She had a family in Frisk, and a job that involved taking care of monsters and humans, not, uh, penguins. And she was gracious! She thanked you for everything so many times, left cookies for you and the boys to eat after she’d gone home, and promised she’d bring Frisk over as often as Papyrus wanted. It was just…

Overwhelming. 

After everyone had left (with another series of hugs, which you were finally starting to get used to), it was just you, Papyrus and Sans left. Papyrus was yawning, more ostentatiously than sincerely, and Sans chuckled. 

“okay, bud. show me where you want to sleep, huh? d’you remember where you left your books?”

“UH… IN THE LIBRARY?!?!” Papyrus acted like it was obvious, then did a big, loud yawn directly at you. “SANS IS GOING TO READ A STORY FOR ME NOW.” He announced. 

“Oh! Cool, Paps!” You said, only a little surprised. Papyrus did have all those monster books he’d brought with him, after all. Papyrus waited for a moment, then tried again. 

“IF YOU WOULD LIKE, YOU COULD LISTEN TO THE STORY TOO. OR EVEN DO THE LADY VOICES, SANS IS TERRIBLE AT THOSE-”

“heh, pal, ______ has had a long day. let’s not pressure her into storytime, k?” Sans said quickly. You shook your head. Yeah, you had a long day, but it could be a little longer. And, fine, you were no Toriel, but reading books, at least, you had covered. 

\-----------------------

Papyrus ended up not wanting any of his own books when he saw the cache of your books from when you were a kid in the library. He began sorting madly through them with delight, as you chuckled. Man, it had been a long time. Well, you’d been a little old for storytime by the time you’d lost your parents, but it had just never occurred to you to look at these again. For Papyrus, though, they were all new treasures. Shyly, he brought one over to you and Sans. 

“Oh, hey! Swimmy! That’s one of my favorites!” You laughed, looking at the book about the small black fish who just wanted to fit in with his friends. 

“IT IS WHY YOU DECIDED TO WORK AT THE AQUARIUM.” Papyrus said knowledgably. You tilted your head at him. 

“Uh, something like that.” You said, not wanting to explain that your boss had found you, hungry and dirty, loitering around the corner of the aquarium a few years ago and waiting for someone to drop a ticket stub so you could claim it go in. It had been your peaceful place, back then. Everything shifting with artificial tides and simple, predictable thought processes, everything calm and beautiful and magical all the same. Changing but… safe. She’d offered you a job taking tickets that day, and you’d quit your dishwashing job that night. And here you were, eight years later, already an expert in so many things…

You were getting off track. “C’mon, dude, let’s go read it.” You encouraged. Papyrus hesitated for a while, trying to choose his room, but one of them had all of his favorite shirts in it, so he ended up wandering in there. You and Sans followed, sitting on the edge of Papyrus’ new bed. 

Sans was the narrator. You, after Papyrus’ prompting, were Swimmy. Papyrus was fast asleep before you were halfway through. Sans closed the book very carefully, and left it on the dresser, then crept out of the room. You followed him, smiling when he shut the light off and closed the door. He walked down the hall, then turned and looked awkwardly up at you. 

“heh. uh, thanks. some people don’t really get paps. i mean, he’s not exactly…”

“He’s awesome.” You supplied with a shrug. 

“he’s a cinnamon bunny.” Sans sighed. “he’s gonna get hurt someday if i don’t watch out. but…” He rubbed the back of his skull again. “it’s better this way.”

“What do you mean?” You ask, nudging him slightly, since he’s fallen still in the hall. He doesn’t move, but looks seriously at you. 

“you think i’m strong?” He says softly. “take a look at me, than at him. notice any difference?” The words are soft and sarcastic. Okay, yeah, you couldn’t help but notice that Papyrus was towering and athletic, and Sans was, well, a little shorter than you and more inclined to sitting and reading something. “papyrus was basically built to… do bad stuff. to humans.” He says with a grimace. “the guy still gets stuck on the junior jumble, but he can build a trap to mess you up in ten seconds. and that’s just when he’s planning, not when he’s fighting. if he ever gave it his all in a fight?” He gives another tired chuckle. “you’d have a really. really. bad. time.” He mutters, gazing behind you at Papyrus’ door. You feel off kilter. 

“But… he’s a sweetheart. He wouldn’t hurt a fly. Well, maybe on accident, but…” Sans snorts, looking back at you. 

“yeah. well, our old man basically gave him to me to raise when paps was just a babybones. he told me what paps was gonna be good at, and that since i was no good in the lab, i should try to raise my bro right to help us monsters, since dad was busy and all.” He gives you a tired, proud smile. “so i did. dad was really disappointed in both of us. pretty good hint i was on the right track.”

“Oh, jeez. Sans…” You mutter, wishing suddenly that you’d tried harder to ask about what had happened to him back on the beach. “Your dad, he’s…”

“gone. for a long time.” Sans says quietly. 

“And your mom?” You hate to ask, but he doesn’t seem to mind. 

“didn’t have one.” Sans says flatly. You’re trying to figure out how that works, but, well, monsters have to be different, right. “it’s always been just us.” Sans says with a shrug. “c’mon.” He says, after a moment. “didn’t mean to bring the mood down so much. just figured, you know, you told me, i should return the favor.” Seeing your confused expression, he sighs. “i know there’s more. it’s just… it’s tough explaining even to monsters. not that i’ve tried, but…” He shrugs. You wonder, for a second, if he’s managed to tell Toriel, then firmly dislike yourself for thinking it. “when i say it’s hard to think about, that’s not me trying to get you to drop it.” 

You nod. You get it. Talking about this stuff is never as easy as you think it’s gonna be. 

“C’mon. Want to watch an episode of dumb TV before bed?” You offer. Sans nods too easily, then squints up at you. 

“just not mettaton, okay?” He says slowly. You clap your hand to your mouth to avoid laughing loud enough to wake up Papyrus.

“Deal.” You finally gasp.

\-----------------------------

You settle on some dumb cartoons, and settle into the couch - you’d had to take a detour for tea, which Sans had no interest in. Sans plops down next to you, his eyes half closed already. Well, eyesockets. How did they do that? You really wanted to know, but you figured you’d pried more than enough today. Besides. He was sticking around, he said, so you’d have time to ask. He might even be telling the truth about that, you mused, taking a sip of tea. 

“Hey.” You mutter after a moment, seeing his head keep nodding forward. “I’m gonna have to get up pretty early to take the bus tomorrow, so I probably won’t see you. You boys gonna be okay while I’m at work?” Sans looks up sharply at that. 

“you don’t need to take the bus. i’ll take you to work.” He says quickly. You shake your head. 

“Sans, please be cool? Please? I’ve taken the bus since I was a little girl. It’s kind of a pain in the ass, but it’s safe.” You mutter. “The drivers know me, it’ll be fine.” Sans grumbles quietly.

“yeah, but i can get you there faster.” He finally says. 

“Yeah, basically anything can.” You laugh. “But it’s okay. You can’t take me everywhere forever.”

“not if you don’t even let me start.” He says. You sigh, and rub your forehead. 

“You let a kid wander through the Underground on their own.” You point out. “I’m an adult, and I think it’s probably safer for me as a human up here as it was for Frisk down there. I’m taking the bus, you can just decide whether or not you want to be a butt about it.” He’s about to speak again, but you cut him off. “Look, if we’re going on that date tomorrow? I just don’t _do_ the controlling boyfriend thing, okay?” He looks up at you, suddenly hurt. “I’m not saying that’s what you are.” You supply quickly. “Just… some guys have been interested in me before because they think I’m a project. I’m not. I don’t need fixing, okay?”

“never said you did!” Sans says, sounding hurt still. You sigh and reach over, taking his hand. 

“You can’t fight the entire world, bonehead.” You murmur. “Please don’t fight me, either.”

“i just want you to feel safe.” He says quietly. 

“And with you guys here, I do. But you know what’s going to make me freak out? If I feel like I can’t step outside without security.” You say. “I’ve got your number, I promise I’ll call if I run into trouble. And, you know, I’ve been living on my own for a while, I know the tricks. No dark alleys, no following strangers, no getting into unmarked vans…”

“or marked vans.” Sans says quickly. 

“Vans in general.” You agree.

“unless you know the van owner.”

“Right, well, let’s not be ridiculous.”

“what if you knew the person driving the van but it wasn’t their van?” He’s smiling a little again. 

“This is a weird hypothetical.”

“answer please.”

“I would exercise my discretion.” You say smugly. Sans sighs. 

“guess i can’t ask for much more than that.”

“You can ask for the world, pal, doesn’t mean you’re gonna get it, though.” You laugh, leaning back into the cushions and feeling like you’d just won a major victory. 

“then i won’t bother asking.” He says, and you barely have time to register that giddy, charged feeling of magic at your side before his lips are on yours once more - wow, three kisses in one day, he must actually really like you! - part of your brain chirps, before the rest of it screams that it should shut up and enjoy the moment.

OH. He _does_ have a tongue. A… very talented tongue. You’d need to tell Undyne. Eventually, you have to pull away, because the thought of her reaction to that news is threatening to make you laugh, and you can’t stand to hurt his feelings again. Unfortunately, when you do so, you have nothing to say to explain yourself. He looks up at you, that blue light still sparking in his eye. He looks… nervous? The credits to the TV show are rolling in the background, you notice. Well, you’d said an episode of TV...

“Goodnight, Sans.” You murmur, and stand up. After a second of thought, you bend, and kiss the smooth dome of his skull. “Get some sleep, okay?”

“night, _________.” He says, sounding a little unsure. 

You still wait up, in the dark, until you hear the click of the bedroom door next to yours swinging shut.


	18. In Which Nobody Can Find Appropriate Foundation for Papyrus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, this one counts as 12/19's post, I'm just putting it out early cuz I'm a busy little, um... thingy, tomorrow. See, look at me, a responsible adult, keeping up with her responsibilities!
> 
> ehehehe.
> 
> [for all your garbage needs](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

“YOU JUST LEFT?” 

“Okay, ow-”

“YOU DON’T JUST LEAVE. HE SPILLED HIS HEART TO YOU!”

“Yeah, and then he went full Twilight on me, so…” You grimace at Undyne.

“AND THEN HE KISSED YOU. WITH TONGUE.” Your eyes go wide as a few other female employees in the locker room whip their heads around to look at Undyne. 

“Hey, shh!” You hiss. The older woman in charge of the harbor seals clicks her tongue at you. You squirm slightly. Oh, you can’t deal with maternal disapproval. Undyne rolls her eye at the woman. 

“And then he kissed you. With his t-”

“Why do I tell you things?” You whine. “Anyway, what was I going to do? Stay?”

“Uh, yes?” Undyne cackles.

“Dude. We’re not dating. We’re not anything. He’s a guy that’s lived in my house for _one day._ ” You hiss. “I can’t just, you know, see where things go…”

“Well, why aren’t you dating?” Undyne gripes. “Look, I waited years for Alphys. We could have just been happy so much earlier if we’d been honest with ourselves.” You narrow your eyes at her. 

“I haven’t known him a week yet.”

“Didn’t stop you from moving in together.” Undyne points out. You open your mouth to make a comeback, then scowl childishly at her. Oh, you hate it when she’s right. 

“Still. It’s all moving a little fast, you know?” You plead, still feeling the eyes of the old woman on you. She’s clearly unhappy with what she’s been hearing. Best not to pay attention, you tell yourself. 

She grumbles something under her breath as you walk past. You can’t quite make it out, but you can tell from the look on her face that whatever she just said was absolutely vile. Ugh, you can’t make a scene, you decide. Besides, people have been saying horrible things about you long before you shacked up with some monsters. You decide to take the higher road and ignore her. Unfortunately, Undyne isn’t on the same page. 

“What did you just say?” She growls, taking a step closer to the woman, who cowers. 

“Nothing!” She insists. “I just think…”

“You. You don’t say anything about my friends. Not ever again.” Undyne snarls, taking another step forward. You grab her arm, as if you could possibly hold her back. 

“Undyne, please. Please. Stop.” You beg. 

“She said-”

“I don’t care.” You whisper. “You need this job. Please.” The woman looks a little smug when Undyne grunts and steps back. You glare at her. “Hey. I wasn’t done.” You say clearly. “You have a problem with me or my friends? You say it right to my face.” You don’t care if it’s about you, honestly, but if it had been bad enough to upset Undyne, you wanted to be able to stick up for her. She stares at you. 

“It’s filthy and immoral, dating one of those abominations.” She finally snaps. “Enjoy the penguins while you can, sweetie, you’ll be missing that A/C when you’re burning-”

“Abominations?” Suddenly, Undyne is the one holding you back, as you feel your hand form a fist of it’s own volition. “You closed minded little… bitch, you see something new for once in your withered little excuse for a life and you can’t fucking wait to act like you’re better than it, well-” You cut yourself off as Undyne tugs you sharply backwards. 

“Stop it, stop it, stop it.” She chants almost silently. “Come on, let’s go feed the penguins.”

“That piece of shit-”

“Hey. She can be wrong. Her loss. Come on.” Undyne hisses, and bodily drags you out of the locker room, though not before turning around and dragging her finger across her throat, then pointing at the woman. You can hear the locker room erupt in conversation just before the door closes, and you curse quietly. “Hey.” Undyne says. “C’mon, please stop. It’ll be okay.”

“She called you a... _an abomination!_ ” You hiss. “Like there’s something wrong with you!” 

“I’ve heard worse.” Undyne says. “But you’re going to lose your job if you don’t play this right. Let’s go, we need to get started.” You grit your teeth, but eventually nod and allow yourself to be led, firmly, to the feed room. 

“I’m not letting that slide.” You sigh. 

“So how did you manage to convince Sans you needed to take the bus?” Undyne changes the subject pointedly. She is suddenly all self control when she’s the one being insulted, not you. She’s also, annoyingly, right. You make a face, picking up a bucket of fish. It takes you a while before you’ve stopped steaming enough to answer the question. 

“I, uh, left two hours early.” You admit. “I left a note.” Undyne looks sideways at you. 

“I’m sure that went over well.” She mutters. You shrug. 

“Well, he didn’t text or anything.” You say, feeling a little guilty. 

“What did the note say?” Undyne asks. You grimace.

“Boys - decided to go in early and get a start on penguins. See you at home!” You recite. You’d spent a while trying to phrase that note, after all. Undyne stares at you. 

“‘Get a start on penguins?!?’” She repeats. You wince. “What could that possibly mean!?”

“They might not know that’s not a thing?” You say hopefully. She groans, pushing the door to the penguins open. You glance up to the gallery instinctively, and relax slightly when he isn’t there. Well, of course he wouldn’t be. He was listening to you, right? He was being good and not crowding you, and you definitely weren’t avoiding him because you felt a little uncertain. You let out a nervous laugh, and then turn to Undyne. “Hey, um, can I ask you an embarrassing question?”

“Always.” Undyne turns her sharp smile at you, simultaneously tossing a handful of fish out to the birds. 

“Okay. Um, Sans and Toriel?” You say quietly, crouching down to hand-feed a chick.

“I’m going to need a little more.” Undyne laughs. 

“Is there like… a history there or something?” You ask sheepishly. Undyne bursts out laughing. 

“HA!” She finally laughs. “God, Toriel is like a billion years old! I can’t even imagine… I mean, ew!” You squint at her. 

“Undyne, how old is Sans?” You point out. She begins to answer, then shrugs. 

“Eh, time isn’t such a big thing underground.” She says. “But, you know, he only showed up a few years before we got out. Maybe… ten, fifteen?”

“Jeez, how old are _you_!?” You sputter, laughing. Her answer, in the form of a shrug, sets you off more, until you’re just giggling into the bucket of fish. “Okay. Okay. I guess I’m just being-”

“Jealous?” Undyne supplies. 

“Awkward.” You conclude. She winks at you, throwing out another handful of fish. You’re embarrassed at how relieved you feel. Okay, so maybe you were a little possessive of your bonehead too. It was scary, how fast that had happened. But… well, you liked him an awful lot. And you couldn’t just try to measure up to everyone. You’d make time to hang out with Toriel one on one, you resolved. Getting to see the little cutie would just be a bonus. 

“Okay, my turn to ask a question.” Undyne speaks up. 

“Go for it.” You shrug, holding a fish up in the air, since the chick you’re feeding seems likely to choke on the one already in its’ mouth

“What are you wearing for your date tonight?” She asks. You slowly feel your thoughts crawl to a halt. This is your brain hitting a blue screen of death. 

“UM. GREAT THINGS?” You suggest, too loudly. Undyne cackles. 

“Need help?”

“I don’t even know where we’re supposed to be going!” You say helplessly. 

“Well, I know someone who can pick out a look that’ll be great for every possibility.” She says mysteriously. You stop feeding the penguins to glance at her. 

“Is it Mettaton?” You ask, arching an eyebrow. Undyne flushes bright red. 

“I know like, seven people!” She bellows. “Do you want his help or not!”

\--------------------------------

When you get home after work, Mettaton is waiting for you at the door. Undyne had driven you home, thank goodness, since Papyrus was already expecting her company tonight, so you had a little time. Which, judging by the tsking sounds Mettaton was making, was surely necessary. 

“Darling, you need a shower yesterday. You reek of anchovy.” He sighs dramatically. 

“Is smelling like fish a bad thing?” Undyne asks poisonously. A lesser robot would have backed down. Mettaton just arches an immaculate metal eyebrow. 

“For a human, it is a very bad thing.” He says succinctly. “Now go on, hurry, shower, I’ll get set up!” That sounds frightening. But, well, you prefer this Mettaton, who is clearly not flirting with you, much more than the act he’d put on to needle Sans. You decide to give him the benefit of the doubt. You hurry upstairs, grabbing a towel out of one of the cupboards, and scrub under the steaming hot water until there can’t even be the slightest lingering odor. You yelp when you hear the door open, but Undyne’s voice calls out, 

“Just me, loser. Mettaton told me to leave your outfit on the hook. So. Outfit is on the hook.” She sounds disgruntled by his choice, which makes your stomach twist. When you get out, however, you’re pleasantly surprised. He’s dug up a classic cobalt blue dress you’d forgotten you owned, with a much-loved leather jacket to go over it and ankle boots that definitely don’t belong to you, but fit anyway. You’re still a little dubious about the outfit, but after you’ve dried your hair and slipped it on, a few seconds in the mirror shows that Mettaton certainly knows what he’s doing. It’s casual without seeming lazy, cute without seeming like you’ve put a lot of effort in. You step outside the bathroom and back downstairs shyly. 

Undyne wolfwhistles. Mettaton clicks his tongue approvingly.

“Makeup time!” He calls. 

“Oh, uh, my stuff is all in the drawer upstairs.” You say. Mettaton smirks. 

“No need, darling, I brought my own.” The next twenty minutes are an ordeal of being told to look this way, that way, don’t blink, definitely, definitely don’t blink, don’t lick your lips, don’t you dare touch your face, no seriously, don’t touch, undyne, hold her arms so she doesn’t touch her face…. and so on. You’re just getting frustrated to make a break for it when Mettaton sighs, “Finished!” and holds a mirror in front of you.

You look… just like you. But you on a really, really, really good day.

“Mettaton, it’s perfect!” You say, jumping up (and startling Ghost, who had been sniffing around your feet). 

“You’re perfect, darling. I had a wonderful canvas.” He says, and seems totally unsurprised when your enthusiasm got the better of you and you wrap him in a hug. Well, everyone else seemed to hug all the time. You’re just getting in the spirit. 

“er…” You leap back at the voice in the hallway. Sans and Papyrus are standing there in the threshold, both looking a little confused. 

“He did my makeup!” You blurt. 

“you look great!” Sans says at the same time. The two of you stare at each other, and you contemplate the physics of just melting into an awkward puddle on the floor. He’s neatened up a little, you notice; he’s traded the slippers and basketball shorts in for sharp black shoes and a pair of dark jeans. He’s still wearing that parka, but underneath is definitely a brand new blue shirt - it matches his eye, you think, and then try hard not to smile. Oh, man, everyone is just looking at the two of you. Is the puddle thing really not an option?

“WILL YOU DO MY MAKEUP NEXT?” Papyrus saves the moment by asking. Mettaton looks delighted by the prospect. 

“Certainly, dear one. Sit right down and let me have a look!”

“Oh, this is going to rule.” Undyne laughs, flopping back down on the couch. There. The sudden pressure has lifted. 

“Should we, um, go?” You stammer. 

“please.” Sans says appreciatively. When you walk over to him, he takes your hand and your nerves fade to background noise. Why does that just feel right? “cool if we take paps’ car?” You nod. Of course, there’s no other car to take, unless he’s got one hidden away, but he seems to be careful about asking after your conversation last night. 

“Bye guys!” You call over your shoulder. “See you later tonight!”

“Stay out late, make bad decisions!” Undyne calls back gleefully. You can hear her as the front door closes, “Mettaton, no, that foundation doesn’t match at all, he’ll look ridiculous.” 

Outside, Sans smiles at you. “good day at work?” You think back to that awful woman and seesaw your hand in the air. “sorry.” He says, sounding like he truly means it, and holds the door to Papyrus’ convertible open for you. 

“How about you, what did you get up to today?” You ask, sliding into the passenger’s seat. He gives you a crooked smile. 

“same thing i do almost every day. sat at asgore’s, read through proposals, gave my advice, kept an eye on my bro.” You blink at him, feeling ridiculous that you hadn’t asked about what he did before. 

“How’s it going?” You ask. Sans breathes out through clenched teeth. 

“slow.” He admits. “everytime i think we’re getting somewhere, some new branch of human government has a problem. it’s tough. paps has a good time, though, he mostly plays with the dogs and waters the plants. oh.” This reminds him of something. “i, uh, got you some flowers. in the backseat.” He says, grimacing. “i didn’t think until later how dumb that was, you know, bringing flowers back to my own house, so uh, you can just leave them there…” You’re already twisting around to find them. 

“Aw, Sans…” They’re beautiful. You don’t know much about flowers (that was the gardener’s job; he’d tried to teach you how to care for them a few times but it had mostly been futile) but you knew that these were gorgeous. “Nobody’s... ever gotten me flowers before.” You say softly, still admiring them. They’re red, violet, white, blue; every color but yellow. 

“heh. it’s not much.” You can hear the smile in his voice. 

“It is to me.” You insist, gently laying them across your lap. You smile the whole way to the restaurant.

\--------------------------

The restaurant, unsurprisingly, is Grillby’s. Sans looks hugely apologetic as he parks. “sorry. know we’ve already done this one.” He mutters. “not too many places around that i can make sure you won’t get bothered at, though.”

“Hey, Grillby’s is awesome.” You assure him quickly. You’d been worried about that too. “Besides, I’m glad we came back. I forgot something here last time.”

“oh, okay.” Sans sounds relieved. “good. glad.” You slip your hand in his after you get out of the car, realizing too late that he’d been hustling over to open your door - you’d need to tell him that wasn’t necessary - and walk up to the entrance. The bouncer is waiting. 

“Hey!” He cracks an enormous grin. “Hot date, Sansy!” You expect Sans to glare, but he merely smirks at the bouncer. 

“yup.” He’s even got a little extra bounce in his step as he opens the door for you, which makes you grin. You wonder if the bouncer recognizes you as the same disaster caked in bird poop from a few days ago, and decide it doesn’t matter. “so what did you forget?” Sans is asking. “grillbz probably has it in the lost and found.” 

“Doubt it.” You mutter under your breath, and practically tug him through the center aisle before you lose your nerve. When you halt, he glances around, confused. The place is crowded with monsters (and the few odd humans) tonight, and there aren’t any free tables near you. You glance upwards pointedly, and he looks around for a second before spotting the mistletoe. You let this register for a second before leaning in to kiss him. 

Phew, it’s different, making out on a couch (or kissing by a weird topiary) than doing this in public, in front of strangers. Especially, you realize, when the cheer goes up a second later, strangers who all know Sans. 

Dear god, it’s a restaurant full of Undynes. Right now, you’re too caught up in the moment to even care. And you don’t care, you decide. This just feels right, being with him, caring for him, having a good time together. You’re going to let all those worries about propriety go, and not weigh the risks and rewards so carefully this time. You’ve got something you want, and he’s here, holding onto you, and if he’s not going to run, neither are you. You’re going to go for it. 

You let the kiss go on for a few seconds longer than is probably prudent, and are met with another embarrassing round of applause when you finally part. Sans is grinning at you, astonished and pleased, but if anything the rest of the patrons are even more enthusiastic than him. 

“cool.” He finally announces, over a chorus of “yeah Sansy”s and more wolfwhistles. Some of those seem to be coming from actual wolves, you note, and spot Lesser Dog with a pack of other dogs, wagging his tail into a blur and waving energetically. You grin and wave back, then chuckle as it’s Sans’ turn to tug you forward into a corner booth with a “reserved” sign. You’re feeling anything but reserved right now. 

The first of many rounds of free drinks arrives only a few seconds later. Accepting the Spider Cider with a laugh, you meet his gaze. 

“so, we’re on a date.” He says. 

“Agreed.” You say, tilting your head at him and smiling. He reaches for the other cider, and drains half of it in one gulp. 

“so.” He tries again. “we’re dating now.” He looks at you, like he thinks he’s getting away with something. You want to roll your eyes, but you can’t stop smiling. 

“We’re dating now.” You agree again. 

“did i already say ‘cool?’” He asks, sounding casual, but his cheeks are bright blue. 

“Mhm.” 

“‘great?’”

“Totally overused by this point, babe.” You laugh, the endearment slipping out before you can stop it. Then again, you don’t want to stop it. 

“‘neat-o?’” He attempts, his grin growing even wider at the affectionate term. 

“Is neat-o really what you want to go with?” He contemplates this for a moment, then shakes his head. 

“i’ll think of something. how long i got?” He asks, taking a much more reasonable sip of the cider now. 

“However long you want.” You assure him. You can tell from the look on his face that he has every intention of taking his time.


	19. In Which The Weird Topiary Returns And We All Feel Kinda Guilty About Judging It Before

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now: time for old aunty TST's Fanart Appreciation Corner:
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> 
> [BOOM](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135507983051/fuwarara-just-a-thing-from-a-cool-fanfic-i-was)
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>  
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> 
> P.S. Don't call me Old Aunty TST, I changed my mind.

You can’t remember the last time you had this much fun. Definitely not on any of the dates you’d been on before, which were usually nervous, uncomfortable affairs where you danced around questions about your family and finances. But, well, all that was out in the air with Sans, and he was still sticking around, it seemed. More than that, he was smiling like you’d never seen him, and he was even eating, not just sipping condiments. Well, he was doing that too, but you were sure that he’d actually consumed a few fries this time. And, wow, was he laughing. You were telling him about some of your funnier moments at work, like the time you’d managed to fall backwards into the touch tank you were supposed to be manning, and how you’d had to be helped out, dripping, with a crab attached to your, well, butt by its pincers while a group of first graders looked on in delight. He loved that, maybe too much, and had then started reminiscing about all the ridiculous jobs that he’d taken on in the underground. 

“...so, the kiddo comes up to me, just hauling all this gear, right?” He laughs. “just tons and tons, a dirty bandaid, biscicles, this weird bandana, just can’t hold a single thing… and they ask me for a hot dog.” He shrugs. “so i balance it on their head. and they just love it. they ask me for another one, so i figure, let’s see how far we can take this… and it was about thirty before the kid lost their balance. i had to pay for ‘em all, but it was so worth it.” He wipes a tear of mirth from the corner of his eyesocket. 

“D’you ever miss it, down there?” You ask after a moment. He stops laughing to think about this. 

“some things.” He finally decides. “i mean, it wasn’t home, but it had a lot going for it. snowdin town especially. me and paps had this big house. obviously, not like where we’re living now,” He says with a snort. “but it was pretty nice. lots of room, smelled like cedar when it snowed, which was almost always. people were friendly. pretty safe, unless you were a human.” He says, his face clouding over slightly. 

“Do you ever want to go back?” You ask. Sans shakes his head quickly. 

“nah. i’ve had enough years of not seeing the sky.” He says softly. “out here, everything’s so much more…” He pauses, then takes a sip of his third or fourth cider. “real.” He finally decides. “you know that what you’re looking at is the real thing, not just an imitation made by someone who doesn’t even remember what the thing was like in the first place. i mean, the king did his best. we had daytime and nighttime, and plants and trees, but…”

As he speaks, he sketches out the simpler words in the air with his hands for you; you’d mentioned you wanted to learn how to sign better, and once he’d pried all the dirty ones you knew out of you (and he’d just been delighted by those), he’d decided that you should begin learning at once. 

“You said it wasn’t home, though.” You say softly, feeling your brow furrow. “So… where did you boys come from?” Sans blinks at you, then makes the sign for “complicated.”

“it’s really hard to get into.” He says, then seems to rethink this, looking you over. “you know what? maybe i can kinda show you. uh, not where i came from. can’t get back there. but, y’know, the basics. you done eating?”

“Oh!” You’re more than a little surprised; you’ve been getting used to the “it’s complicated,” answer without any followup. “Sure, I’ve just been drinking for a while. Let’s go.” Probably, you’d been drinking a little too much; when you stood up, you felt a little tipsy, but nothing that Sans’ hand in yours couldn’t alleviate. 

“kay.” He smiles at you, a little nervously, as you shrug your coat back on. “grillbz, can you - yup, thanks.” He says, grinning at the bartender when you walk past. Grillby had let out a series of crackling, popping noises that Sans seemed to understand easily. He holds the door for you, and you step outside. Oh, finally, the temperature has plummeted, and a few flakes of snow are lazily curling down from the sky. It’s wonderful. You take a second to look up at the sky, and feel his arm twist around your waist. 

“you wanna go home?” Sans asks. Home. He says it like he really does feel like he belongs there. You smile to yourself and nod, then blink. 

“Hey, hang on, we’d better call a cab, unless drinking is different with monsters.” Thinking of the passed out mouse you’d seen on the bar, you doubted this was the case. Sans chuckles. 

“i’ll pick the car up in the morning. look, so this is what i was trying to explain.” The air suddenly seems to snap with magic. You feel your knees threaten to buckle almost instantly in response, a warm heat crossing your face as you let out a slight giggle. Sans smirks at you. “you really are a crazy human, huh.” He says fondly. “everyone else wants to run at the first sign of magic, but if i didn’t know any better i’d say it turns you-”

“SANS!” You begin to protest, but he’s already cut himself off deliberately, a very evil smile on his face.

“-into one of the happiest people I’ve ever seen.” He purrs pointedly. You scowl at him, which only seems to make him more smug. Stupid observant Sans. “anyway, look. in front of us. What do you see?” You squint. 

“Um. Nighttime.” You mutter, then suddenly gasp. When you move to the right angle, you can see the hint of something else, something familiar… it’s one of the paving stones by the front door to your house. But it’s here, in the downtown street next to Grillby’s. You walk a step to the side, and the image vanishes. “Hang on. Where did it…” You mutter to yourself, and try stepping back to your original position. This time you see it. It’s so hard, since there aren’t any clear concrete edges to look at, but you can finally make out what’s going on. It’s like… “It’s a doorway. You made a doorway to my house in the middle of the air.” You say, astonished. “How…”

“magic?” Sans offers. You glare at him, and he gives you a broad grin. “look.” He removes his hand from your back, and holds it up, the bones shining yellow under the streetlight as he stretches out his fingers each as far as they’ll go, like those hand turkeys you used to draw in kindergarten. “okay. tip of my first finger, tip of my thumb. how far apart would you say they are?”

“Uh…” You manage to pry your eyes from the door again, and look at his hand. “I don’t know. Say… like ten… centimeters?” You guess. Sans nods. 

“sure. that works. how about now?” He makes an “O” shape with the two fingers, so that the tip of his fingerbone and his thumb bone are just barely connecting. 

“No distance.” You supply. 

“okay. so the house is normally about fifteen minutes away from grillby’s, driving, right.” You nod. “and we treat that like it’s a constant, because most people need to take the slow path…” He spreads his fingers again, and moves a finger from his other hand to illustrate the painstaking progress down each joint of his first finger, to the crook between finger and thumb, then all the way to the tip of his thumb where it finally halts. “but me… i can just do this.” He brings his finger and thumb together again, then nods at the door. 

“So you moved our house?” You say, confused. He shakes his head. 

“nah. house is where it is supposed to be, promise. i just found the fastest way between those points. i poked a hole in the space between them.” 

“You made a shortcut.” You say, beginning to grasp this, and Sans nods, delighted. 

“exactly. you ready?” He nods at the nearly invisible doorway. “it’s easy, promise. the kiddo almost never even noticed when i took ‘em through. just don’t touch the edges, it feels really weird.” You swallow, then tentatively stretch your arm out through the hole. It’s maybe a tiny bit colder on the other side. A snowflake lands on your hand, and you wonder, if anyone was outside looking at this, if they’d see you, or just a hand reaching out from nowhere. “you’re good.” Sans urges. You grit your teeth, then step through, 

“SANS!” You bellow, almost immediately, a note of panic in your voice. Sans steps through a second later. 

“hey, woah, it wasn’t that bad.” He’s saying, but he spots the source of your distress a second later. “shit.” Half the trees in the front yard are burning.

\-------------------------------------------

“We didn’t even notice.” Undyne says, shaken, standing outside and looking at the crisped remains of the bushes. “We were just watching TV. The windows in that room face the wrong way. We had a fire going too. Didn’t smell the smoke.” You’d had to call the fire department, of course, and they’d shown up quickly, to their credit. They hadn’t reacted to the four monsters either, just had set about doing their job putting it out. 

One had come over to your small group, huddled outside, to show you the makeshift incendiary device that they’d found in the ashes of that topiary you’d kissed Sans at just the other day. Mettaton is furious. 

“They didn’t even come close enough to the windows or doors for the alarms to do a damn thing.” He hisses, all the playful affectation out of his voice. Sans isn’t even saying anything at all. He’d just shrugged off his parka and passed it to you to keep warm as the firefighters worked. Papyrus kept looking at him nervously. 

“At least it didn’t reach the house.” You sigh. “The gardener’s going to be furious.”

“they’re watching you.” Sans hisses. “us. you think that it’s a coincidence where the fire started?” You feel your face burning, your heart plummeting. If you hadn’t been so ostentatious, maybe this wouldn’t have happened.

“How could they be watching? We didn’t see anyone all yesterday, and I know we were looking out.” Undyne mutters. 

“Cameras.” Mettaton suggests, his eyes distant. “Hidden somewhere. That’s exactly what we did. Keep an eye on the enemy, right?”

“I’ll call Alphys.” Undyne says. Sans shakes his head. 

“it’s too late. ‘sides, the firefighters were all over the yard.” He mutters. “paps, you see any traps?”

“N-NO, BROTHER.” Papyrus’ teeth are chattering. “I THINK I WOULD BE ABLE TO SEE THEM, TOO. WHOEVER DID THIS TOOK THEIR TOOLS WITH THEM.” You remember what Sans had said the other night, about how Papyrus could construct a trap in ten seconds, and believe the taller skeleton. The snow is falling harder now, and everyone but Sans and Mettaton seems to be feeling the cold. 

“Guys.” You finally sigh. “It’ll be alright. Let’s get back inside.” Sans gives you a wide eyed look, his iris glinting blue. 

“go in.” He agrees. “i’m gonna wait.” You don’t like that tone. 

“No, you’re not, bonehead.” You say, wrapping your hand around his wrist. So many little bones, you think, held together by what? He looks back out at the yard, stubborn, angry at the idea that you might want him to see reason. “They said that we’re gonna have a police patrol here tonight.” You whisper. “I think they take arson a little more seriously than vandalism. Besides. It’s snowing.” 

“so?”

“So if anyone tries to creep around tonight, they’ll leave tracks.” You mutter. The ridges on his skull that approximate eyebrows raise at that. 

“smart.” He whispers. 

“And we’re safe in the house. They can’t get close without the defenses going off, and they know it. And they’ve done the damage that they can do.” You sigh. He looks up at you, still so sharp and charged. At least for the moment, you’re done with swooning over Sans when he uses magic. You understand what Papyrus said earlier. It’s scary. “C’mon, Sans.” You urge. “You can’t leave me on my own tonight.” That, at last, gets him to nod slowly. 

“i’ll take you to work tomorrow?” He says, not really making it a question. You understand, though, and simply nod. 

“Okay.” You look up at Undyne and Mettaton. “Guys, thanks so much.”

“For what?! Letting your yard almost burn down?” Undyne scoffs. You shake your head. 

“For being here.” You whisper, thinking about what would have happened if it had been Papyrus, all alone inside the big house, who had spotted it. Would he have cowered, or called Sans? Or would he have done what Sans said he was designed for?

Mettaton and Undyne share a look. Mettaton leans over, and kisses Undyne’s cheek, then Papyrus’, before turning to you. 

“I’m going to Alphys’.” He says. “We’ll have something for the perimeter ready by tomorrow morning, love.” 

“Mettaton, you don’t -” He lets out a tinkling, sardonic, utterly metallic laugh. 

“I don’t sleep, pet. I’ll have plenty of time to get this right.” He says. “Undyne’s going to stay with you tonight too.” You glance at Undyne, still holding Sans’ wrist. She nods quickly. Sans shifts slightly, and you don’t need to look to feel the power that was crackling around his body waning. He’s, once again, letting cooler heads prevail. 

“we’re getting you a guard dog.” He finally sighs, looking up at you. “i’ll borrow one from asgore tomorrow while you’re working.”

“Okay.” You don’t even fight that either. Looking out across the yard, you can just see the first police patrol drive past on the public road. “Come on, guys. Let’s get inside before Papyrus freezes.” Undyne smiles sadly and holds the door. Papyrus, after making certain that Sans is going to come too, bolts inside. Undyne follows him. 

“heh. _papsicle._ ” Sans mutters. You feel your shoulders slump. 

“There you are, bonehead. I was starting to worry.” You whisper, brushing your lips across the top of his skull. “Come on, baby. Let’s cuddle up in front of the TV, just try not to think so much about it.” You urge, and he finally moves, walking with you through the door. You shiver slightly as you lock the door behind you, and not from the cold, either. Papyrus is waiting for you there. 

You can’t help but notice in the light that he has, frankly, spectacular winged eyeliner on. You can’t help it. The whole night has been way, way too much. You begin to giggle, then chuckle, then heave with laughter. Papyrus says,

“WHAT IS THE MATTER, HUMAN? IS THIS A NORMAL THING TO DO AT FIRES?” He begins to laugh too, which just sets you off more. Finally, even Sans joins in.

“you just look great, bro. we didn’t expect it.” You nod in total agreement, finally reining in your chuckles. Papyrus just shrugs. 

“I ALWAYS LOOK GREAT, BUT METTATON DOES HAVE WONDERFUL COSMETICS. I HAVE THIS BISHIE CREAM…” He begins to list all the different products Mettaton’s produced over the years as he wanders through the house to the TV room. With another tired laugh, you slip your hand down to twine fingers with your boyfriend’s, thinking about the distance between points, and shortcuts, and magic. And fear. And hope. 

And how much Ghost is going to hate any guard dog.


	20. In Which Undyne Gets a Biology Lesson (and it's Not a Metaphor, it's a Literal Biology Lesson)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Twenty chapters. Well this is just WILD.   
> I really wish I could put this on my resume. 
> 
> Important updates:
> 
> [Some fun sketches of various CoBC nonsense!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135654014261/ipainttheskywithmycolor-i-drew-all-of-these)
> 
> [A sneaky preview of some quality Christmas fluff!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135643024736/patchworkfelicity-i-needed-to-draw-more-fanart)
> 
> [And the thing you never knew you needed in your life, elaborate makeover Papyrus!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135608601326/selzziram-i-gotta-totalskeletontrash-bahahah)
> 
> Thank you rascals so much for making drawings and talking at me and sending me weird asks (and normal ones too)! I love all my children equally, but I love you, in particular, the most. 
> 
> P.S.  
> I forgot to mention. You're my child now.

Things feel a little better when the four of you are in the TV room, something mindless on the screen nobody’s really paying attention to. The lights from the Christmas tree make everything seem safer, though you all let the fire in the fireplace burn down to ashes without comment, other than a few anxious glances. “I need a shower.” You finally mutter to nobody in particular. “I smell like a… a campfire.”

“optimist.” Sans says disparagingly, kicking his feet up on the coffee table in front of you. He’s barefoot, and the bones clatter against the polished hardwood. 

“Fine.” You roll your eyes. “I smell like an arson. Better?” Undyne throws a pillow from the sofa she’s sharing with Papyrus at Sans. 

“Don’t be a jerk, Sans.” She demands. “________, go shower. We could probably all use one.”

“Well, there’s more showers in this house than there are people here right now. Let’s make that happen.” You say. “Undyne, let me lend you some clothes, okay?” You knew the boys were already set with that. However, neither of them move when you and Undyne do. You give Sans a look, wondering if he’s thinking about giving you the slip, but Papyrus speaks up. 

“GUARDS GO IN SHIFTS.” He says, looking at Undyne like he can’t believe that she hasn’t already explained that. 

“Papyrus, we aren’t really…. yeah. Okay. Fine.” She says. You grimace slightly. You want to tell him that he doesn’t need to act like you’re under siege, but you’re not entirely sure that’s true anymore. 

“Paps, I’m sorry.” You say. “I didn’t do you any favors, asking you to move here, huh?” He blinks at you, bewildered. 

“I AM HAPPY TO BE HERE FOR YOU, HUMAN. I WOULD HATE IT IF WE STILL LIVED IN THAT APARTMENT AND WE DIDN’T KNOW WHAT WAS HAPPENING.” He says earnestly. Sans nods quickly. 

“not like we didn’t see the same stuff back there, anyway.” He shakes his head. “uh. not exactly the same. we didn’t have much to burn in the first place.” He says dryly. “go on, we’ll hold down the fort.”

“I hate that you sound like ‘holding down the fort’ isn’t a metaphor.” You sigh. “C’mon, Undyne.”

\------------

The shower is necessary. One thousand percent necessary. You regret, for a few minutes, scrubbing Mettaton’s handiwork off your face, but it’s worth it to stop reeking of smoke and to get the circulation going in your toes again. Besides, now you can change into your sweatpants and fluffy socks, which shouldn’t feel like an upgrade from the carefully chosen outfit from earlier, but, sadly, does. You comb out your hair, rub your eyes, and look tiredly at the mirror. God, you need to be at work in five hours, but you can’t even think about sleeping right now. It’ll be fine. You’ve gotten by on worse. And you’re really not in danger, you know that, it’s just… tough. Losing things you didn’t realize you’d care about losing. Well, your car, sure. You cared about that a whole lot. But your trees, your front yard, your confidence that nobody would bother trying to hurt you if you just stayed under the radar… You sigh, and trudge downstairs and through the halls to, you suppose, let someone else take the next shower shift. You took way too long in there, you’re surprised nobody went up to check on you. 

Undyne is already totally settled in downstairs, a towel wrapped around her head in a practiced twist. One of her… gills? ears? fins? Anyway, it’s trapped under the towel and you itch to free it, but simply sit down next to her since you’re not sure if that’s rude. “Hey.” You sigh. 

“Hey, feel better?” 

“Tons.” You admit, and nod to the spots Sans and Papyrus had been occupying. “You actually talked them into washing up?” Undyne chuckles. 

“It was not easy. Papyrus didn’t want to wash his face and ruin his makeup, and Sans said he didn’t see why, being a skeleton et cetera.” You roll your eyes. Sans could definitely be lazy when he wanted to be, particularly when he was in a sour mood. 

“How’d you do it?” You ask, tucking your feet under you. 

“I said that if you didn’t want to smell smoke anymore, he probably wouldn’t get far smelling like smoke himself.” Undyne says, arching an eyebrow. “Then Paps called him a babybones afraid of the water and he couldn’t let that happen.” You begin to chuckle, and move a throw blanket over your waist, getting comfortable. “Hey.” She says after a moment. “Don’t be mad, okay?”

“Uh oh.” You mutter. 

“I, um, called Barb and told her what’s been happening?” She says softly. Your eyes go wide. 

“Undyne! You can’t just call our boss about stuff like this! Oh, god, she’ll think I’m such a crybaby-”

“No.” Undyne says sharply. “You… ugh, _________! This is exactly what you call a boss for! She’s furious at you-”

“I knew it.” You groan.

“-for not telling her first that you were having all this trouble!” She hisses, marching onwards as if you hadn’t spoken. “God, she says you’ve never taken a vacation day or a sick day or a personal day, not once!”

“Because I don’t want to get fired! I need to be perfect! That job is all I’ve got!” You cry, the words practiced from years of repetition in your head. 

“You know that’s not true.” Undyne says, narrowing her eye at you. “You _know_ it isn’t.” You take a deep, panicked breath. Barb didn’t know anything about your personal life. You’d kept it that way on purpose. If she’d known for sure that she was hiring a hungry kid who was just desperate for something, anything, she’d have cut you off for sure. Nobody wanted someone like you working for them, they could steal or make dumb decisions, they were bad employees. And you’d yelled so much at that stupid old lady today, someone must have told Barb. Oh god, then Undyne calling on your behalf, she’d know you were a trouble maker, a piece of trash nobody wanted to bother with (god, that voice in your head sounded like your aunt sometimes)...

“I’m fired, right? I’m fired. Okay. Okay. It’s okay. I know it wasn’t on purpose, Undyne, I can find something-”

“Stop!” Undyne begs. “You’re not fired, you…” She clearly keeps wanting to call you a name like nerd or loser, but she can’t bring herself to when you look this upset. “Please, calm down.” She begs. “She’s giving you until New Year’s off. Demanding it, actually. With pay.” She adds quickly. “And… a bonus.” 

You stare at her, your stomach slowly untwisting. 

“What?” 

“Uh, yeah. She pulled up payroll to get that set up, and she was going through your employee file, and she noticed you hadn’t taken off for the holidays ever. Ever.” She sighed. “And that you hadn’t put in for overtime either.”

“Well, my hours weren’t any longer, and it wasn’t like I had anyone at home-” Undyne scowls at you. 

“Anyway. She added that up. Plus all the vacation and personal time you never used. Plus interest.” She says pointedly. 

“...How much?” You barely dare to ask, feeling unsteady by this sudden chain of news. 

“Enough for a new car.” Undyne says with a smirk. “Or a used car and a few extra things for yourself. 

You grip the armrest hard. Suddenly, all sorts of different worries in your head have been set at ease. 

“On one condition.” Undyne adds quickly. “You have to take the time off, _______. She’s totally serious. She has no idea how you got away with it for so long, but she’s not going to let you keep going.”

You nod mutely. An actual break. And you couldn’t turn it down, couldn’t feel guilty about it, couldn’t think it would reflect badly on you…

“I wish you’d told me.” Undyne’s sighing. “I was only going to go in tomorrow and the day after, then I had until after New Years off myself. At least now we can hang out. God, you’re such a nerd!” She laughs, seeing the relief on your face. “You’re lucky you’ve got someone like me around to look out for you!” 

“I don’t know how I ever deserved it.” You murmur, thinking about a new car, and enough money for presents for your friends, and a cat castle for Ghost, and maybe a real feast for Christmas dinner, with a turkey and all your friends… “Undyne, I can’t even begin. My life has changed so much this past month.” You whisper. 

“Not all bad, right?” Undyne says, elbowing your ribs. You squeak. 

“Even with the bad stuff, I can’t remember being this happy.” You tell her softly. 

“neat-o.” You glance up quickly to see Sans walking over, smiling to himself and wearing a pretty similar sweatpants and t-shirt outfit to you and Undyne. 

“Were you eavesdropping?” You laugh, smiling as he plops down right next to you. 

“me? nah. just heard the end bit.” Sans says with a lazy shrug, wrapping his arm around your shoulders and playing with your damp hair almost immediately. That feels so nice that you almost don’t care if he’s telling the truth. “good call on showers, by the way. i feel better. why are you so happy though?”  
\---------------------------------------  
You tell him, then you tell Papyrus all over again when the taller brother comes to join you. After another round of scolding for never taking a break, both Papyrus and Sans look excited.

“you know, we could take some time too. not like we’re getting anything done at assh-” He glances up quickly to catch Undyne’s eye, a smirk on his face. “uh, i mean, asgore’s.” Undyne snorts, but doesn’t argue. Huh. So maybe Sans wasn’t that fond of his employer, after all?

Then again, the way you’d heard it, Asgore had killed six kids. So, righteous cause or not, maybe you didn’t blame Sans.

“WE COULD MAKE SNOWSKELETONS AND SNOW FORTS AND DO ALL THE THINGS FROM SNOWDIN!”

“get a few igloos made for l.d. and g.d.”

“What?” You interrupt. “Sans, if you’re serious about asking Lesser Dog and… G-greater Dog?” You guess. Sans nods proudly. “If they’re staying, not in igloos, jeez! Where do they live now?”

“DOG HOUSES. BUT THEY LIKE IGLOOS TOO.” Papyrus chimes in. 

“How about the pool house?” You offer. “You know, that little guest house in the back?” 

“huh. was wondering about that. that works.” Sans says with a laugh. “hm, what else?”

“COOKING CONTEST!”

“Christmas cookies?” You offer shyly. Papyrus nods eagerly. 

“FRISK CAN COME PLAY!” 

“Definitely.” You agree. 

“More anime?” Undyne offers. 

“Why not?”

“getting a crack at your parents’ library?” Sans asks. “well. that one’s mostly for me. you guys don’t have to do that.” He adds, his bones scratching your scalp idly as he continues to toy with your hair. You have to keep telling yourself not to make embarrassing noises. 

“Of course.” You manage. It all sounds so relaxing. “Mmm, and a new car. And I can buy presents. Can we all have Christmas here?” You ask, barely restraining a yawn. A few days ago, you never would have suggested it. Now, it seems like you’re stating the obvious. 

“Duh.” Undyne chortles, watching you slump slightly, letting your head loll onto Sans’ shoulder. Why was it soft, like flesh was there when you knew it wasn’t? Then again, why didn’t his shirt cling to his bones and hang off him? You didn’t bother to ask. Magic. It’s complicated. But Papyrus wasn’t like this. He didn’t ever show signs of using his magic to form a body that wasn’t there. He just was the way he was, in his hilarious shirts and his scarf, and his tiny… pants? Like there couldn’t be another way to be. But Sans…

You think about what you’d been talking about earlier that night, what had prompted you going through that door through nothing into the chaos of your yard burning. You’d been asking where he and Papyrus had come from, and he’d taken you outside and poked a hole in reality. 

For the first time, you think of what really should have been an obvious question from the beginning. After all, there were no other monsters like them, as far as you knew. And Sans said the Underground hadn’t been home. So...

Had Sans and Papyrus always been skeletons?

The thought begins to wake you up, but when you glance up at Sans, he looks so content, almost proud that he’s lulling you to sleep, that you decide that you can ask it later. You should really go to bed, you know it, but right here and now you feel so safe and peaceful. “I think I’m gonna…” You mumble into Sans shirt. “So ‘leepy all of a sudden…”

“the adrenaline’s probably worn off.” You can sense, rather than see, Undyne’s perplexed stare at Sans when he explains, “humans make this thing that gets them all wound up when there’s danger. read it in a book.” 

“What, like coffee?” Undyne says quietly, standing up. Sans shakes his head. 

“nah. they make it inside, like magic. human bodies are so cool. they just heal themselves, you know.”

“Yeah, I know. After Frisk…” She trails off, shaking her head. “Hey, Paps, show me a bed I can sleep in.” 

“OH YES, YOU MAY HAVE ONE OF MINE.” Papyrus can even, somehow, yell a whisper. You stir slightly, thinking about standing up and following them upstairs, but Sans shakes his head, and you catch the motion out of the corner of your eye. 

“stay?” He asks quietly. “this night… it scared the hell out of me, babe. i don’t think i can… i won’t be okay if i don’t know you’re okay.” 

“I’m okay.” You whisper, half asleep, then understand. He doesn’t want you out of his sight, but he can’t very well invite himself into your room to keep watch. The sofa, however, has become a safe space for the two of you. Which is all well and fine for his bony butt, but you’re thinking of your down comforter and the memory foam topper you’d sprung for on your mattress last year. Ugh. You peel your eyes open, and with great effort, stand up. He looks up at you, big fake smile and eyes like you’d just kicked a puppy. You can’t stand it. 

“C’mon.” You yawn, holding a hand down for him. “Upstairs. You can know I’m okay, I get to be in a bed. Win/win.” He blinks at you, then takes your hand, accepting the help up and chuckling when you sway slightly from the sudden effort. Once you’re upstairs, he speaks again. 

“you know, i’m not trying to-”

“I know.” You assure him, seeing the color on his face when you reach your room. He must think you’re ascribing all sorts of motives to this plan, but you know him better than that. “Hey, Ghosty.” You murmur, slipping inside your room and hearing a familiar purr. Leaving the door a tiny crack open for him, you slide into bed almost immediately, navigating the room by the sliver of moonlight that’s lit it up. After a moment, when Sans still hasn’t joined you, you look up. He’s waiting uncertainly by the door.

“C’mere.” You yawn, pressing your face back into your pillow. “You gotta sleep too.” You assume. You feel the familiar weight of Ghost settling by your feet, and a few moments later, the unfamiliar weight of a heavy skeleton makes the other side of the mattress droop. That’s better. You’re too tired to feel awkward as you curl up next to him, tucking your head under his jawbone and brushing your lips against his sternum. “Everything’s okay. Sleep.” You whisper, and just barely recognize a heavy arm moving across you, fingers once again returning to your hair, before you pass out entirely.


	21. In Which Ghost is Fed What is Objectively Probably Pretty Gross Cat Food

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi gang! Just a warning: if I don't get a chapter out every night from now until X-factor (which is what I call x-mas, which is what other people call christmas) it is because I am having a lovely time with my family. 
> 
> Not because I am planning a spectacular emerald heist. Why would you even suggest that?!
> 
>  
> 
> FANART CORNER 4 KIDS
> 
> [This actually nearly made me do a self-Heimlich maneuver. Don't eat crackers and look at fanart, kiddos.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135716226081/sansinmypants-now-i-want-u-all-to-look-at-this)

“BROTHER?” The agitated cry wakes you up with a start.

“Sans?” Undyne’s voice follows, sounding a little panicked. “Shit. Shit. Shit. Okay.” She chants quietly, sounding much closer than Papyrus. Ugh, it’s early. It has to be, if Undyne isn’t at work yet. You peek your eye open. Yup. Sun isn’t up. You groan quietly, your face pressed against something hard. You were hoping to sleep in, but-

Your bedroom door slowly creaks open, and Undyne’s voice, already apologetic, announces;

“Hey _______, I don’t want to barge in. Sorry to wake you. But... Sans’ room is empty and Papyrus is… oh.” She suddenly stops talking, as her eyes adjust, and you shudder slightly to hear her thrilled intake of breath. 

“tell ‘im i’m fine.” The voice by your ear rumbles. “‘ve fun at work. say hi to penguins.” Sans sounds even more exhausted than you, which is saying something. God, why was he so comfortable? You feel like you should be embarrassed, but you’re so happy here that you can’t manage feeling awkward…

“Right! Okay! Penguins!” Undyne says, so enthusiastically that it physically hurts. “Closing the door now!”

“No… can’t close it.” You moan. “Ghost needs to get out.”

“He’s out! Fed him! Salmon and liver flavor! I have some questions about what liver is, but - later! Have fun! LOTS. Bye!” Undyne practically yells. The door swings shut, which makes the noise in the hall just a little quieter.

“UNDYNE, DID YOU FIND HIM?” 

“Shhh! Yes! He’s asleep!” Undyne hisses.

“BUT THAT’S WHERE ________ SLEEPS?” Papyrus sounds confused.

“Uh.” You wince slightly, hearing the hesitation in Undyne’s voice. Sans’ arm tightens stubbornly around your waist, and suddenly you care less. “I guess they’re sharing a room.” Undyne explains, sounding sheepish.

“WELL, THAT’S SILLY. THERE’S SO MANY ROOMS! HE DOESN’T HAVE TO BOTHER ________. HE CAN HAVE ONE OF MINE!” Papyrus insists. Undyne chuckles, and says, 

“C’mon, bud, you can tell him that later. Want eggs?”

“NO! ...MAYBE! … YES!” Their voices fade as they walk away from the door. You sigh softly, then peek your eyes open.

“We should probably get up.” You whisper. Sans shakes his head. 

“nnn. first good sleep in years. ‘cept for when you were on my lap the other day. that was good …” He yawns, his breath ruffling your hair, and makes a soft, pleased noise when you twine your arm around his ribcage and begin absently stroking his spine. Right now, the softness you often feel around him is gone; his guard is down, and he’s reduced to just bones, which you find terribly sweet without exactly understanding why. 

“Okay. Don’t have to tell me twice.” You whisper, and, taking the better of your curiosity and position, lean in to kiss one of the bright, polished vertebrae of his neck. 

“hng.”

Well, _that_ sound is new. You’re tempted to look up and see the look on his face, but… well, you’re not going to, because you’re caught somewhere between sleepy and wondering if you can make that happen again. Delicately, curiously, you kiss his neck once more.

“nnn. not fair.” He whispers tightly. You scooch your head up so it’s resting on the pillow opposite him, studying his face through the cracks in your eyelids and the faint blue light of the sun threatening to rise. 

“Why not?” You say, sleepily and way too innocently. You know what you’re doing, after all, you’re just too tired and comfortable to care that you’re being bolder today than you have been, god, years. 

He doesn’t have an answer for you, just looks at you with those deep, inscrutable eyes, the white lights tiny, distant. 

“you’re making it very hard to be a good guy. don’t want to take advantage.” He grumbles, and catches the smirk on your face even in the dim light. “hey. hey, you should not look that pleased with yourself.” 

Drat. He’s noticed you’re having fun. “Not taking advantage.” You yawn, snuggling up against his ribcage and tucking your head back under his jaw. God, you’re even talking like him now. Just to thoroughly prove your point, you kiss his vertebrae once more, slowly, and are thoroughly rewarded by a soft groan and the feeling of his fingers sliding through your hair.

“what’s gotten into you?” He finally whispers, inching away again. You’re not exactly sure, to be honest, other than the fact that you’ve woken up to find him still holding you and you _like_ it, and you’re too tired to pay any attention to the little voice that tells you to stop doing things because they’re stupid and wrong. 

“I’m allowed to kiss my boyfriend.” You say petulantly, looking back up at him. Stupid skeleton, moving away on you. 

“okay, yes, but i’ve been making the first - wait. boyfriend?”

He sounds so surprised that you have to rub the sleep from your eyes and look at him properly.

“Uh, yeah. Right? I mean, I thought that after last night...” Suddenly you feel unsure. Maybe you’d misinterpreted everything. You did that sometimes, you messed it all up -

“hell yes.” Sans says, his eyes snapping with light for a second, before one bright point fades and the other quickly turns blue. You let out a soft, slightly wild giggle, feeling like you’d won something. “i’m your boyfriend. you’re my girlfriend.” He tries out, grinning hugely. He sounds ecstatic, and you’re not at all surprised this time when pulls you closer to kiss you soundly. Ah, that’s much better. This time, when his tongue finds yours, you can’t help but make a soft, satisfied noise and inch back closer to his ribcage. He has to be the one who pulls away first this time, and when he does, you’re embarrassingly out of breath and practically clinging to him.

“i… uh, i don’t really know what i’m doing with humans…” He breathes. Hmm, so he knows what he’s doing with monsters? You have a sudden image of him in this position with Toriel and have to try hard not to make a face. 

“You’re doing great so far. And I don’t really know… anything about how skeletons, um…” You blink, feeling your confidence waning, then gasp suddenly as he moves, feeling his teeth and tongue on your neck.

Hng.

Well, if anyone knows how to shut up that little doubting voice, it’s Sans. 

“_________, BROTHER, THE EGGS ARE FINISHED AND THE SUN IS UP. NO MORE BEING LAZYBONES!” Oh god. You jerk about a foot backwards, convinced for a second that Papyrus is in the room with you. Sweeping the room with a quick glance, you determine (thankfully) that he must be just on the other side of the door. Sans looks questioningly at you, then the door. You nod quickly. 

“k, bro. we’re coming.” Sans sighs. 

“GOODIE!” You hear the clattering of bones slapping the floor as Papyrus tears off. Sans stares at the door, and shakes his head disbelievingly. 

“for such a cool guy, he can be a real, uh… barrier?” He mutters, flushing a brilliant shade of blue that’s just barely illuminated with the watery light from the rising sun. You snort indelicately at his choice of words, and try not to fall into another laughing fit. In that brief pause before ‘barrier,’ you could just sense him trying to come up with a euphemism for ‘cockblocker.’

“Awfully cocky, aren’t you?” You drawl with an evil grin, knowing you’re being a little unkind. You brace yourself for the chill outside the bed - Sans is almost like a furnace - and finally resign yourself to pushing the covers back and standing up slowly. Sans shrugs, unapologetic, then nods, standing up himself. You yawn, thinking that you probably look a fright, but you don’t want Papyrus to come charging back and asking questions. Sans smiles at you then nods at the door. 

“let’s go. we can nap on the couch after paps makes us eat.” Oh, thank god you’ve found someone who likes naps as much as you do.

\-----------------------------

“YOU TWO CAN’T SLEEP THE ENTIRE DAY! WE HAVE TRAPS TO BUILD!”

“no traps, bud. not in snowdin anymore, remember?” Sans is drooping slightly into the plate of scrambled eggs in front of him on the counter. 

“BUT I COULD BUILD A FEW! METTATON AND ALPHYS ARE INVENTING TRAPS, AND I’M DEFINITELY THE BEST ONE AT IT, SO -”

“no traps.” Sans yawns. “humans. friends. remember?” Papyrus gives you a guilty look, then looks back at Sans. 

“BROTHER, THEY ARE NOT ALL OUR FRIENDS…” He says, sounding a little agitated. “THEY ARE TRYING TO HURT OUR _______.” Sans pauses his reach for the ketchup bottle for a slow second, maybe considering this, then grits his teeth. 

“no traps.” He repeats. “thought you wanted to build snow skels, anyway.” Papyrus flushes, like he’d been caught at something. 

“R-RIGHT. OF COURSE.” He says, and then looks at you. “HUMAN, YOU ARE NOT DRINKING YOUR COFFEE. YOU TOLD ME YOU NEEDED IT TO FUNCTION. PLEASE DO NOT BREAK!” He sounds so upset that you have to grin and take a giant sip. 

“Great coffee, Paps. Good eggs and sausage too. No spaghetti?” Papyrus rolls his eyes at you. 

“I HAVE ALREADY SPOILED YOU WITH MY FINEST DISH, HUMAN.” He says. “YOU WILL SIMPLY HAVE TO GROW ACCUSTOMED TO OTHER THINGS.” Sans snickers before taking a gulp of ketchup from the bottle. 

“wonder how she’ll survive.” He mutters. You give him a look, then tell Papyrus, genuinely, 

“All your food is awesome, Papyrus. Seriously. You’re a great cook!” Papyrus practically glows with pride, then, seeing your plate is empty, hops up from his seat, towering over you. 

“NOW IS IT TIME FOR SNOW SKELETONS?” He says eagerly. Sans shakes his head. 

“the two of us need a nap, bro. let me pop out, grab the car from downtown for ya, and you can go see if l.d. and g.d. want a new gig?” 

“LAZYBONES! HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY NEED A NAP!?” Papyrus screeches. You chuckle.

“Guess humans aren’t as tough as monsters, Paps.” You yawn, and seeing he’s about to light into Sans, add, “and it would be good if Sans could hang out with me, in case those jerks come back.” 

“OH, OF COURSE, HUMAN. FORGIVE ME.” Papyrus says contritely. “GO GET MY CAR, SANS.” 

“kay.” Sans stands up, and stretches his arms. There’s barely a blip, and he’s gone. You look up at Papyrus.

“Can you do that?” You wonder out loud. Papyrus shakes his head mournfully. 

“I WOULD BE SO MUCH GREATER IF I COULD. SANS CAN’T EVEN EXPLAIN HOW TO DO IT!” He whines. You wonder if Sans can’t explain, or if he won’t, then jump as you hear the sound of the door to the garage opening. 

‘’s in the garage for you, bro.” Sans calls from down the hall. God, that couldn’t have been thirty seconds. Papyrus strides towards the source of his brother’s voice.

“FEAR NOT, HUMAN, I WILL RETURN FROM ASGORE’S WITH DOGS.” He announces. You wave at him, then grin at Sans as he walks back through the threshold. 

“sofa?”

“Sofa.” You confirm. 

\----------------------------------------------

When you’re sprawled back out on your side, your head on a cushion balanced on Sans’ lap, covered with several throw blankets, all you want to do is sleep, but you’re feeling keyed up from the coffee and guilty that you’re not at work. You keep shifting around, keeping Sans awake when he surely needed the sleep worse than you. 

“you’re not comfortable.” Sans sighs. 

“No, no, this is perfect.” You whisper, and you mean it. “I just need some background noise or something. Sans shrugs, and switches on the TV, grimacing when Mettaton’s face fills the screen. You, on the other hand, grin. This was the first time you’d seen him on TV since you’d met him. 

He’s on some talk show; you can see people lined up in the window behind him and the two attractive human anchors. The woman is talking.

“-is here to discuss a disturbing trend facing the monster community; and their friends and families.” 

“Is this live?” You murmur, looking up at Sans. He’s fixated on the TV now, but he nods mutely. 

“Yes, darling, thank you.” Mettaton’s sigh echoes through the speakers as he nods at the anchor. “I’m here to talk about a dear human who’s been put through an absolute *nightmare* of a time by unknown assailants. I’ve only known _________ for a short time, but I can assure you, darlings, she is the kindest, friendliest sort of human I’ve ever had the pleasure to meet. I’m just horrified to tell you what she’s been through, since she befriended some monsters famous for helping bring down the barrier…” He continues, but you’re too busy gaping to pay proper attention. You roll on your back to look up at Sans. He’s grinning widely at the TV, but he instantly looks back down at you. 

“My favorite actor’s talking about me on national TV.” You mutter. Sans smiles. 

“he’s smart. hate to say it, but he’s so smart. nobody’s gonna touch you now. cops will have to help. nobody can ignore it.” He says hopefully. You look back at the TV, where a very flattering picture of you from just yesterday is displayed. Mettaton had never taken a picture, not that you were aware of… oh god, his eyes must be cameras. You shiver slightly. 

“My life has suddenly gotten really weird.” You mutter. 

“good or bad?” Sans asks, looking down at you. You think about this for a second. 

“Perfect.” You decide.


	22. In Which You Become Intimately Acquainted With Another Monster's Tongue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have returned from my holiday seclusion, and let me tell you, did I ever get some good shit!   
> *pats emerald necklace unobtrusively*  
> *pats elaborate emerald sombrero less unobtrusively*
> 
> I missed u kiddos, but I hope those of you who celebrate Christmas had a blast, and those of you who didn't got to eat some good takeout and see Star Wars. 
> 
>  
> 
> FANART FANDANGO:  
> [CUUUUUUTE SHIT CUTE SHIT](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135812365431/patchworkfelicity-here-it-iiiis-my-christmas)
> 
> [and its companion piece (not really) LOST MY SHIT](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/135829990611/randomfandomdrabbler-hahahahhahahahha-okay-im)

Well, calling your life “perfect” might be a little premature. This one sliver of life, however, was pretty great. You felt so relieved to see the anchors react with horror as Mettaton described what you’d been facing. It was honestly a little shocking. You’d been imagining yourself as alone in all of this, and all of a sudden, it was dawning on you that this simply wasn’t true. If Barb had your back, and even people on the news you’d never met were showing support, then there had to be other people out there who wouldn’t try to hurt you or your friends. “I guess… I didn’t really think that anyone would care.” You mumble into the pillow on Sans’ lap. “I thought… I don’t know. I mean, there’s not a lot of people out there going out of their way to support monsters in the first place, and it seems like I meet a new human who has a problem with you guys every day…”

Sans thinks about this for a while. “the people who feel the strongest emotions tend to be the loudest about them.” He finally mutters. “it’s not a good thing or a bad thing, it’s just … a thing. but it means that you tend to hear their opinions over the crowd. and it’s easy, sometimes, to think that just because the most of the loudest voices you hear are saying one thing, that everybody in the world thinks that same thing.” You have to think about that too. 

“So… you think that there’s lots of people out there who would feel comfortable acting the same way I do, but they just don’t speak up?” You ask dubiously. Sans shakes his head quickly. 

“no. i don’t know. maybe. there’s a spectrum.” He says. “people aren’t just good or bad, you know? they’re just… the sum total of their decisions.” His brow furrows. “every choice you make shapes you into the person you are. you, uh, can’t go back and change them, so each time you make a decision, it helps define what kind of being you’re deciding to be.” He says. Why does he have that funny tone in his voice though, the one he sometimes uses when he’s lying? He clears his throat.

“not everyone would make the same choices as you.” He continues. “doesn’t mean they’re terrible. doesn’t mean i’d like them very much, mostly. but they’re not the same guys who would wreck your car or burn your yard.” You feel your brow furrow. You have the sense he’s talking about more than just why it seems like you only heard awful things about monsters from humans, but you’re just not getting it. 

“But me and the other quiet people don’t get noticed over the loud assholes who wrecked my stuff.” You say through a yawn. Sans groans. 

“this is a bad metaphor.” He admits. “but you’re thinking about it wrong. if the assholes are loud, then you’re loud too. i’m talking actions, not words.” He mutters. You blink. You’ve always faded into the background before. It’s weird to be thought of as loud. But, well, yeah, you could maybe see it now. Maybe the average person wouldn’t invite monsters into their home. Not after knowing them for a few days, at least. Maybe you’d made choices that a lot of people would like to think they’d make, but would be too scared or shy or self serving to do. You shrug self consciously, trying to shake the thought off almost immediately. You’re not that used to compliments, though you’d gotten more in the past week or so than you had for years. Sans notices, of course, and refuses to let it slide. 

“i’m… a pretty good judge of character.” He says thoughtfully. “i liked you the second i saw you. couldn’t have imagined that someone like you would exist up here, though. you don’t think about things the same way a lot of people do. when you get put in a place where you can either react with fear or kindness, you always react with kindness. not that you’re naive. i really don’t think you are. you’re just, uh, it just takes guts to be like you.” He says, a little shyly. You squirm slightly and he laughs. “gonna have to get used to compliments, babe. i think after word gets out, you’ll be hearing a lot more of ‘em.”

“Eep.” You breathe, thinking suddenly of all the additional attention being on national news is going to bring. You must be looking a little wild-eyed, because Sans shakes his head and gently pulls the covers back up around you. 

“it’ll be fine. you’ll have your friends with you.” He promises. “get a little more sleep, ok?” More sleep would be good. Your head is beginning to pound a little, and your stomach is twisty with too much coffee on a mostly empty stomach. Still, you don’t want to leave him feeling like he needs to guard you. He’d surely slept less than you last night. 

“You too?” You whisper. 

“me too.” He confirms. It still takes a while, but eventually, the sound of his heavy, regular breathing (filling lungs that, naturally, aren’t there) lulls you to sleep. 

\-----------------------------

You’re awoken by something wet sliding across your face. Your eyes fly open, and you jerk up before recognizing the source. Lesser Dog sits on the ground in front of you, beaming. 

“Oh! Hey bud!” You say, surprised to see the dog six inches from your face. Sans is awake too, and his eyes are narrowed at the dog.

“less of the face licking, pal.” He drawls. You arch an eyebrow at him; surely it’s silly to be jealous of a dog for doing dog stuff, right?

“PROBABLY SANS IS JUST TOUCHY BECAUSE HE WANTS TO GIVE YOU KISSES INSTEAD.” Papyrus says from the doorway with a cackle.

“yup.” Sans tells Papyrus matter-of-factly. “where’s g.d.?”

“HE DIDN’T WANT TO LEAVE KING ASGORE.” Papyrus sighs mournfully, flopping down on the cushion next to your feet - well, actually, kind of on your feet. You snicker and tug your feet out from under him, sitting up. “BUT LESSER DOG SAYS THAT YOU ARE HIS BEST FRIEND SO HE WANTS TO COME STAY WITH YOU FOREVER.” Lesser Dog whines happily, his tail a blur of motion.

“he’s a dog. everyone’s his best friend.” Sans snorts. “thanks for comin’ though, pal.” He adds after a second, reaching out to scratch Lesser Dog behind the ears. Lesser Dog whines again, until, with a sigh, Sans slides over so he can hop up on the sofa between the two of you. Did the dog have opposable thumbs? You had a lot to learn about monsters still. “so, bud, you really want to stay and uh, sniff around for trouble?” Sans checks. Lesser Dog nods quickly, his tail thwapping you on the back as he tries to wag it again. 

“Do you want to stay in here, or do you want your own house?” You check with the dog, whose eyes practically bulge at the idea of his own house. “Ahaha, okay. Let me get some warmer clothes on and I’ll show you, L.D. But you’re welcome in here whenever, okay? Just, uh, don’t chase the cat.” Lesser Dog yips, and bounces up to his hind legs - he seems to switch between standing like a human and walking like a dog whenever the mood strikes him. The more you watch him, the more you realize that he’s remarkably… malleable? Elastic? Well, bendy, for a dog. Sans and Papyrus stand up too.

“I’D LIKE TO SEE THIS TINY HOUSE FOR DOGS, HUMAN.”

“Oh, sure, c’mon guys.” You say, forcing yourself out of your comfortable nest of blankets and to your feet. “Why don’t you get dressed for the weather? You wanted to make some snow skeletons, right, Papyrus?” You check, then, hearing a soft whine, grin at the dog. “You too, L.D.?”

You’ve never seen a happier looking dog. Even Sans looks a little impressed. 

\-----------------------------

Lesser Dog loves the poolhouse. It really isn’t big; it’s got a bed, a kitchenette, a bathroom and a sofa and TV. It’s toasty, though. Thank god your parents set aside money in a trust for heating and maintaining the mansion in their will, or you have no idea how you would have kept the place running. Lesser Dog sniffs every inch of it, sometimes on two feet, some on four, then runs outside, returning with a suit of… armor, you guess? Well, he hangs it in the closet with a clang, and then sits right by the door, waiting for you to open it, even though he’d done so himself just a second ago. 

The rest of the day passes in a blur of snowy activity. Papyrus and Lesser Dog begin sculpting their snow masterpieces almost immediately, while Sans takes your hand and asks you to show him the entire grounds.

“Sure.” You say. “Let’s start out back.” 

He hates the private beach in the daylight, or at least, hates the fact that there’s no fences or anything blocking people from wandering onto it. “Look, even if we did have fences going that way, they wouldn’t keep anyone out. If someone really wanted to, they could just swim in.” You point out. Sans groans. 

“i keep forgetting you guys can do that.” He mutters. “the kid couldn’t. oh, is that what the pool thing is for?”

“Um, yes?” You laugh, then blink. “You can’t swim?” 

“i can sink.” Sans says with a shrug and a grin. “gonna be a problem? not too late to turn me in for someone more buoyant.”

“But you’re my _buoyfriend._ ” You laugh, raising an eyebrow. Sans has to do a doubletake at that, and is soon shaking with laughter. 

“you must think i’m _shallow_ to worry about it.” 

“This is an awfully _deep_ conversation to be joking about.” You reply with a smirk. He applauds; one point to you. “Anyway. We can’t fence off the sea. Well, like, we could but I think that’s called a net, for one, and it’s impractical. Also, uh, I’ve got no intention of trading you in. Turns out I like my guys bony.” 

“why, though?” He asks, surprising you a little with the seriousness of the question. 

“I don’t know?” You laugh, feeling a little awkward. “You’re cute, and funny, and nice, and smart as hell, and caring, and you … make me feel safe. And wanted. And protected.” He ducks his head to hide a huge smile, cheeks stained blue. 

“cute?” He repeats. You grin. 

“Yes, bonehead. Cute. I’m not the first human out there to have a thing for a monster, you know.” You laugh. This seems to be the right answer, even though, well, there weren’t all that many humans dating monsters (though Mettaton had enough fans of every possible variety of human that it seemed likely that this might start to change). Sans kicks bashfully at a snow poff, then leans up to kiss you softly. 

“thanks.” He says quietly, then grins, looking around. “okay. sorry. got distracted. we’ll just see what mettaton and alphys came up with for defense, and work with that. ugh, i feel like that guy is _everywhere_ right now. i hate how grateful i am. i know.” He holds you off. “being an ungrateful jerk. but that guy… i swear, he’ll hit on anything that moves. or doesn’t move. i saw him try to seduce a vending machine once.” He grumbles. You try not to laugh at the mental image. “anyway, can’t do much now. let’s see what paps and l.d. are up to.” And with that, he starts up the hill back up to the house, heading around to the front yard where Papyrus and Lesser Dog are playing. You grin, shrug, and trudge after him, leaving fresh footprints in the soft, still falling snow. 

\---------------------------------------

“papyrus. what. is. that.” He demands when he turns the corner to see the snow sculptures that the skeleton and dog have been working on. Papyrus blushes.

“IT’S MY FRIEND METTATON!” He says quickly, stepping aside from the piece he’d been working on; an exact, lifesized Mettaton sitting on the couch from that morning’s talk show. He’d even made the couch perfectly. He must have been watching TV over at Asgore’s.

“why are you making a snow mettaton.” Sans demands flatly. 

“HE IS MY FAVORITE SEXY ROBOT!”

“no. no no no.” Sans shudders, and glares at you when you dissolve into a helpless giggling fit and sit down on the snowy cushion next to the snow robot. “can’t you be like l.d.? look what he made?!” He tries, gesturing at the swooping, artistic snowdogs that Lesser Dog had been creating. Papyrus shakes his head. 

“IT’S A TRIBUTE.” He insists. “IF YOU WERE ON TV, PEOPLE WOULD DO IT FOR YOU TOO.” Sans groans, then glances up quickly at the sound of tires tearing down the long driveway. He steps in front of you quickly, then sighs and relaxes as the car comes into view. 

“just undyne.” He sighs, but keeps an eye on her, watching as she hops out of the car and sprints over to you.

“__________! Go inside!” She yelps.

“what is it?” Sans says urgently.

“ARE THEY COMING BACK TO TRY TO HURT __________?” Papyrus cries. 

“I don’t know!” Undyne says, stopping in front of you, out of breath. “I went in the locker room after lunch and... I heard that old bat calling anyone who would listen and reading your address off some mail she found in your locker. I told Barb; she fired her, but it’s too late!” Hearing the distress in her voice, L.D. begins to whine. 

Sans is already guiding you to the front door, his hand on your back. 

“let’s just lay low, keep an eye open, see what’s coming.” Sans says. “it’s probably nothing. just some protestors or something.” Your stomach twists slightly, and you hurry inside, holding the door open for Papyrus and Undyne - Lesser Dog stays outside, and you can hear a soft growl rumbling from his throat as he drops to all fours and walks all the way to the front fence, waiting for any threats to arrive.

The wait for whatever happens next is tense and excruciating, but in the end, it only takes a minute or two before the first van pulls up, then the second, then the third, fourth and fifth.

“well, it’s not vandals.” Sans sighs, standing next to you and staring out the window. 

It’s almost worse.

It’s paparazzi.


	23. In Which Papyrus and Ghost Finally Become Bros

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've written more that 50k words. That's an entire novel. 
> 
> I HAVEN'T EVEN GOTTEN TO THE SKELETON FUCKING. 
> 
> Okay. 
> 
> Come visit me at [The Very Serious And Official Tumblr Page Of The Author](http://www.totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)
> 
> Oh, and also please enjoy [this awful thing that ao3 commenter Blupo made me write.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136076904551/please-enjoy-the-above-lovingly-crafted-deleted)

“PUPPER-AZI? ARE THEY HERE FOR LESSER DOG?” Papyrus says nervously. You shake your head, and smile a little as Undyne brushes a few half-melted flakes of snow off your shoulder, looking concerned.

“Nah, Paps. They, um, they sell like, pictures or interviews to different newspapers or blogs or whatever?” You attempt. 

“Ugh. That’s… creepy.” Undyne shudders, staring out the window. Sans is glowering next to you, his eye sockets almost entirely black as he focuses on the cars just outside the fence. You groan, rubbing your forehead. 

“They wouldn’t have a clean shot of the front of the house if those assholes hadn’t burned my trees!” You grumble. “Ugh, just… go home! Go to your homes, you weirdoes, have dinner with your families and leave mine alone!” You snap, then, realizing that you’d said that entire thought out loud, duck your head. Calling them your family was awfully presumptuous, after all. “Uh, I mean…” 

Undyne grins at you. “You’re such a dork!” She snickers. “What, you think we’re all gonna go ‘ew, no?’” She bumps your shoulder with hers. “You go to bat for us, you get me hired, you basically start a home for wayward skeletons -”

“-hey.”

“-AND DOGS!”

“-and dogs, your door has always been open for us, and oh yeah, you’re awfully cuddly with one of us (and it’s basically the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen except for Alphys.)” Undyne still sounds gleeful about this last fact. “I’d say that you’re part of our family, huh?”

“DEFINITELY! WE ALL LOVE _________, RIGHT?” Papyrus says brightly. 

“duh.” Sans says, tearing his eyes from the window to give you a quick smile, his cheeks a little blue. You get the sense that he’s teasing you a little - that had been your line after he’d kissed you the first time, after all. You want to punch his shoulder, but you also want to hug him tightly, and you decide on the latter after a second, winding your arms around the skeleton’s waist as he stands, his back to you, staring out the window. He sighs softly, and turns to face you, squeezing you in return and resting his chin on your shoulder for a second before you let him go. 

Undyne lets out a soft “awww” which Papyrus begins to cackle at, but you’re not done. Without any further ado, you hug Papyrus (who dances around with embarassed delight), then Undyne (who hugs you back tightly enough to make your back crack). God, you cared for these people.

“You guys…” You’re embarrassed to feel your voice shake a little. Oh, you hadn’t cried since… not since you were a little girl. No, no, not now. “I still don’t know how I deserve all of you.” You say, blinking quickly. “Jeez. If these stupid jerks would just realize I’m boring and move, then things really would be perfect.” 

“i’ll move ‘em.” Sans says softly, looking back at you with such liking and fierce determination on his face that your knees suddenly threaten to wobble along with your voice. Stupid sexy skeleton…

“Nope. Nice try. You’re still not getting in any fights with any humans.” You’re surprised at how comfortable you feel telling him that. The fierceness remains on his face as he looks up at you, but you shrug.

“Look. I have no problem with you acting in self-defense, but you can’t just attack people. Right?” You say. He looks like he’s about to protest. “You told me how much you admired how Frisk wouldn’t hurt anyone, all the way through the underground, right? Don’t be a hypocrite. No hurting ... unless you absolutely have to.” You sound calmer than you feel. It was one thing to have the nation made aware that you were having these problems, but another issue entirely to have the media camped outside your front yard. At least the yard was big! But, well, they probably had cameras that could pick out every tiny detail even from this distance. You groan and slump slightly, leaning against the window in the entrance hall that you, Sans, and Undyne are all sharing and watching Lesser Dog run along the perimeter, barking angrily. 

“We should call him in.” Undyne mutters.

“let him get his energy out. you know how he gets. he’ll chew up the whole house.” Sans says, leaning slightly against you in that way that you know means he feels sorry for once again proposing he take matters into his own hands. Or maybe not. Sometimes Sans could be an awful liar, but you were beginning to notice that sometimes, he was better at lying than anyone you’d ever met before. 

And, getting the sense that Sans was just about _done_ with letting people mess with you, you were beginning to worry quite a bit about that. 

“Alphys and Mettaton are coming over.” Undyne is messing with her phone, looking at the texts. “Mettaton’s going to blow a circuit. He’s so upset that this is happening.”

“must be _really rough_ on him.” Sans drawls sarcastically, then exhales. “still...” You know what he’s thinking. 

“We need him.” You mutter. “He knows how to deal with these people, we don’t. I just want to do whatever means they go away.” 

\----------------------------

Mettaton and Alphys arrive maybe two hours later. In that span of time, Papyrus has coaxed you all to sit down somewhere where you couldn’t hover over the photographers, so, once again, you all trudge over to the TV room and fall into seats that are beginning to feel familiar. Ghost is even waiting for you there, and doesn’t even hesitate - as soon as Sans sits down (as usual, at your side), Ghost hops into his lap. Aw, gosh, you’re going to melt. Sans glances at you to make sure he’s doing the right thing still, then very slowly, very carefully begins to pet the old kitty. Papyrus watches this with fascination.

“MAYBE GHOST WOULD LIKE TO SIT ON ME TOO?” He says casually. Sans grins, and very gingerly picks the cat up. Ghost begins to rumble with purrs (for some reason, he loves being carried by Sans!) but stops, confused, when Sans gently lowers him onto his brother’s lap. Papyrus hesitates, and you watch, a goofy smile crossing your face, as Sans demonstrates how to hold Ghost, and where he prefers to be pet. You’re awfully fond of your boys, you think, and jump half out of your skin when Undyne nudges your side with an elbow, then winks at you when you whip your head around. 

‘Caught staring,’ that wink says. You give her a mock scowl, then smile once more when Sans crosses back over to sit next to you, leaving Ghost purring on Papyrus’ lap. 

“Good job.” You murmur to Sans. 

“well, he told me when i asked him if he wanted to move that he really wanted to make friends with ghost.” Sans snickers. You nod, as if you hadn’t totally overheard this conversation that was supposed to be private between the brothers, and kiss his cheekbone quickly. He grins at you, looking much more relaxed with the paparazzi out of sight, and you feel the tightness in your chest and jaw finally beginning to relent as well. 

“CAN WE WATCH ANOTHER CHRISTMAS MOVIE?” Papyrus asks shyly. “WE DIDN’T HAVE MORE THAN A FEW OF THOSE UNDERGROUND!” 

“Ha, sure, Paps. You ever see Home Alone?” All three monsters look at you, confused. You grin, pulling your feet up under you and picking up the remote. “Oh, man, I’m so excited! Lucky you, getting to see this for the first time! It’s about this little kid that gets left alone in this giant house by accident at Christmas and these mean burglars keep trying to break in, but the kid’s way too smart so he sets all these traps...”

“Sounds… a little familiar.” Undyne drawls, gesturing at you. You burst out laughing. 

“Well, I don’t think we’ve got burglars to cope with. But maybe we can get some ideas from Kevin.” 

“heh. you watch this when you were a kid?” Sans asks. You laugh excitedly. 

“Like, every week. There’s a sequel too, it’s great, Kevin has to go to New York and… you know what, no spoilers, let’s just watch them!” You say, and select the first movie from a streaming service, grinning when it starts up. It’s just so nice to do these old, familiar things, with these new people that you cared so deeply about, and to feel that something new is starting, something real and concrete and a little scary but wonderful. They’d all agreed that they were your family. You hadn’t known them long enough, it was crazy, you kept telling yourself, but…

This was real. Nobody was leaving. It was happening. 

**************************************

Your soul isn’t a candle, he thinks, watching you. Candles are easy to extinguish. Yours is a bonfire. It was hard to tell that at first, because souls were all, more or less, the same size, same shape, but he kept sneaking glances, kept seeing how much deeper that light went into you. The longer he got to know you, the brighter it seemed that it burned. His fingers itched to touch it, to stroke it, to cradle and adore it the way that you held Ghost - but no. Too much, too soon. He was already pushing his luck something fierce. He’d slept in your bed last night, for fuck’s sake! And, wow, god knew that he hadn’t been thinking about anything other than seeing how far he could _keep_ pushing his luck, when you’d been kissing his throat this morning. 

You just weren’t like anyone else. Oh, he knew, he knew, everyone was different, everyone was a unique miracle, blah blah blah. But you - oh, you were just kind. In spite of everything that had happened to you, your first instinct was kindness. And you were unstoppable. He knew you were worried about the new threat of the media, the old threat of the anti-monster assholes, worried that everything would fall apart, that you’d lose your job, lose your money, lose your new friends, even lose him. 

But you weren’t going to lose him, he thought, wrapping his arm around your shoulders and grinning to himself when you immediately dropped your head to rest on his shoulder, like it was the most natural thing in the world. He was going to stick around, as long as you’d have him (and, well, Papyrus). And as for the rest, all those other worries you were carrying around, well, anyone else, they might weigh down. But you? You just took a breath, bit your lip (god, did you have _any_ idea what that did to him?), and then you just… refused to be overwhelmed.

You didn’t do what he would do in your shoes, didn’t go and panic or sleep for days, you just kept going. More than that, you stubbornly, determinedly, found joy. And in turn, you made him feel joy, the type he’d thought he’d only get once, seeing the sun for the first time he could remember, feeling its heat on his face that first day through the barrier, knowing that he and Papyrus were free, that he’d never watch his brother die again, never watch Frisk flail and panic and hurt others out of fear or frustration or pain ever again, that he’d never have to worry about his father (or was it his creator, Gaster had never been too clear on that) lurking behind doors that shouldn’t be there, sliding through the underground like a computer virus, like malware running in the background. 

He looks at you, and he feels, deep under his ribs, that same sense of wonder and relief. After a year of being disappointed by so many things on the surface, you refuse to disappoint. You were a bonfire. You were that first ray of the sun on his face. You were warmth and light and heat. He stares at you from the corner of his eye, watching you biting your lip again as you try to hide a grin at the antics on the TV. There was only one difference between that feeling he got with you, and the feeling he’d had, with that first glimpse of the sun.

He hadn’t wanted to bone the everloving hell out of the sun.

*****************************************

You’re giggling wildly when Kevin finds the picture of his older brother’s… girlfriend. “‘Buzz’s girlfriend! WOOF!’” You quote happily, then snicker when L.D. props himself up from his position on the floor to look at you. He’d finally come back inside after the sun had gone down and he hadn’t been able to see the waiting reporters as well. “Not ‘woof’ like a dog, sweetie.” You say, giggling again when his tongue lolls out of his mouth. “It means Kevin doesn’t think that she’s very pretty.” Lesser Dog seems satisfied by this, and settles back down, resting his chin on his paws and occasionally letting out a canine chuckle at the TV. Ghost, perched on Papyrus’ lap and eying L.D. warily, finally, very cautiously, resumes purring. You’re simply enjoying the scene (and feeling personally vindicated by the fact that Undyne is in total tears of laughter by the time Kevin’s setting up traps.)

You’re just glancing over to enjoy Papyrus’ rapturous expression as the traps start to get deployed - oh, Sans was going to be angry with you, he didn’t like Papyrus thinking about traps - when you feel Sans’ arm slide down around your waist, and the sensation of lips, with the faintest hint of teeth, sliding against your jaw. You turn to face him, and see the spark of … _something_ in his eye, making whatever comment you’d been trying to come up with die, unsaid on your lips. It’s probably for the best. Sans suddenly seems to have plans for those. Your face starts burning almost instantly as he leans up to kiss you in a way that is, quite frankly not exactly polite to do in front of company. God, you wish you could care that it’s not polite, but you just… don’t. You find your hand spreading out over his sternum, then grabbing a fistful of his shirt, and god, you’re grateful that it’s dark, and that Undyne and Papyrus are fixed on the movie. When you pull away, your breath is awfully ragged and your heart is hammering, and you’re feeling the quizzical eyes of Lesser Dog on you. 

Sans looks like he’s in a similar state, at least, but he’s still glowing slightly with magic, and you just can’t trust yourself. “I-I’m going to get a drink!” You stammer loudly, drawing everyone’s attention. “Anyone else want one?”

“Beer!” Undyne bellows. 

“HOT COCOA! AND WE SHOULD MAKE DINNER SOON!” Papyrus yells. 

“and, uh, water for l.d.” Sans supplies, sounding a little out of sorts. “i’ll give you a hand, babe.”

“Oh!” A very guilty grin is threatening to spread across your face, so you fake a yawn to hide it. “Thanks, Sans!” You both hop off the couch awfully eagerly, and cross the room towards the hallway leading to the kitchen. You’re barely out of the room and in obscured in the shadows when Sans kisses you again, which means, unfortunately, that you are perfectly able to hear the three monsters left in the TV room begin to laugh wildly. 

“DID THEY THINK WE COULDN’T SEE THEM?! THEN THEY TRY ‘We need drinks?!’” Papyrus practically screams. It’s infuriating, how much better his impression of you is than your impression of Sans. “NYEH HEH! HEH!”

“Oh my god, don’t, Paps, I’ll die!” Undyne protests, laughing like you’ve never heard her before. Worse still, Lesser Dog is joining in with huge, howling laughs. 

“so, uh, do you want to hide from them for the rest of your life, or is that just me?” Sans mutters. 

“Oh, no, it’s not just you.” You reassure him. You didn’t know it was even possible to _be_ this embarassed. Still, after a second, you nod pointedly down the hall. Sans lets out a very guilty chuckle, and walks by your side to the kitchen. 

“What was that for, anyway?”

“hm?” He looks innocently up at you, and you’re sure you would have been embarrassed, if you had the capacity to feel any more humiliated. 

“The kiss?” You prompt, switching on the kitchen light. 

“oh. heh.” He rubs the back of his neck. “sorry. you were being too hot. i had to.”

“Had to.” You repeat incredulously. He nods, still flickering with magic. 

“mhm.” He says seriously, and you find yourself taking a step towards him. He grins, such a cocky, pleased with himself grin, that you can’t decide if you want to walk away to make a point or push him back on the counter. Oh, why even offer yourself these choices? You’re going with the option that lets you feel more of that sensation; of magic, of his mouth pointedly exploring yours, of the knowledge that for once, you want the guy you’re with just as much as he wants you. He makes the move first, though, backing you against the kitchen counter and picking back up where he’d left off. You try to stay aware, alert to the fact that your friends will be wondering where you are (or worse, knowing where you are), but by the time his bony fingers tentatively, nervously, brush against your breast, you’ve forgotten the world outside of this room exists.

You’re certainly too caught up to notice the distant flashes of cameras in the backyard. 

\------------------------------------- 

“Darling! Where have you hidden yourself!?” The sound of that familiar voice makes you quickly nudge Sans away. God, if Sans had looked grumpy at the prospect of dealing with Mettaton before, it was nothing compared to now. 

“Sorry!” You whisper, trying to comb your hair back into some order with your fingers

“shh.” He gives you a crooked smile, and glances at your neck, looking awfully pleased with himself. You narrow your eyes at him, suddenly suspicious-

“There you are, darling, you -” Mettaton stops in the doorway, his eyes darting between you and Sans, then groans very theatrically. “Sans. _Must_ you?” He groans, staring at your neck as well. “Now I’ll need to touch up her neck every morning for the next week.”

You don’t like the sound of that. Taking out your phone, you quickly turned on the front facing camera, and spotted, almost instantly, the light bruise already forming from a particularly enthusiastic lovebite. “Sansssss.” You groan, burying your head in your hands. 

“whoops.” He sounds so smug. Oh, god, surely it wasn’t that bad if you kicked your boyfriend, right? Mettaton gives you a conspiratorial look.

“Poor thing. See, this is what comes of being made out of meat.” He sighs dramatically, then perks up. “Anyway, come along, dear. Alphys and I have brought Thai takeout-” Your stomach growls practically the second he says that, “-and we’re going to talk battle plans!”

“you’ve figured out how to get rid of them?” Sans says, pushing himself off the counter and finally beginning to get the drinks out of the fridge you’d theoretically come in here to get. 

“What? Oh, goodness, no.” Mettaton says, leaning over Sans (much to his annoyance) to grab a bottle of chardonnay from the fridge.

“Then what?” You ask, suddenly feeling that you could use a glass of that wine. Or eight. Mettaton locks eyes with you. 

“We’re going to practice. Because you, darling, are going to give them what they want. You’re going to talk to them tomorrow.”


	24. In Which Mettaton has a Very Literal Drinking Problem

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey gang!
> 
> So, against all odds, I have friends, and against all friend odds, those odd friends want to do stuff with me; namely, drink champagne and yell at balls dropping.
> 
> And then, the day after that is New Years Eve!
> 
> (lololol)
> 
> Anyway, what I'm saying is that I won't be back until 1/2/16. Try not to miss me so much, guys. I know you're gonna be pining, but do your best. Plus, you know, I'm a geek who always has her phone, so I'll be at the [TST Tumblr](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com) like a cool person. Like that, uh, that cool squirtle from the pokemon anime with the sunglasses. 
> 
> Sorry about the cliffhanger.  
> Just kidding, I don't know what sorry is. Anyway:
> 
> FANART 4 KIDZ BY KIDS:  
> [An interpretation of Reader!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136159881031/indigoskycaller-quick-sketch-of-my-version-of)
> 
> [SCANDAL!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136160190986/rikuhasarts-because-im-trash-and-like-drawing)
> 
> [Holy Hell, by Slim Shady](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136170254181/selzziram-this-is-how-i-imagine-sans-seeing)
> 
> And bonus weirdness that I drew instead of being a responsible author and adult:  
> [I call this piece Why Did I Draw Baywatch Onion-San (Seriously Why)](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136098457566/this-is-one-of-the-worst-things-ive-ever-done)
> 
> [And I don't even know about this but it exists now and you all have to deal with it.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136100502286/i-was-gonna-do-sans-shaming-but-this-came-out)

“‘m jusht a normarl girrr-”

“Please. For my sanity. Swallow first.” Mettaton says disapprovingly. You roll your eyes, and take another bite of drunken noodles before gulping theatrically, just to make a point, and trying again. 

“I’m just a normal girl.” You repeat. “The only reason people are paying attention to me is because of my friends. They want to hurt my friends, but they’re afraid of monsters, so they’ve resorted to hurting me.” 

“Good.” Mettaton says, leaning forward and putting his metal elbows on the eighteenth century antique whatever table (he’d told you, you just couldn’t remember) with a clank. He’d tried to make the dining room into a war room, but everyone else had been hungry, so it was currently a war/dinner room, which lacked the same effect. “And what if they ask you a question you don’t know how to answer?” You make a face, your stomach growling. You’re so hungry, but Mettaton’s decided to go full on Grandma-from-the-Princess-Diaries on you, and you’ve barely had time to get in a bite.

“I’ll tell them that I’ll get back to them. Or tell them to ask you, you’re way better at all this than me.” You say, grabbing another forkful of noodles before Mettaton can ask you another question. 

“she’s good, bud.” Sans insists when Mettaton opens his mouth again. “you said she’s only gonna talk to the nice ones, anyway. let her eat.” You make an appreciative noise, and swallow, then grin over at Papyrus, who hasn’t said a word this whole time, his mind just absolutely blown by all the different types of noodles. He was poking at a piece of fried tofu in his pad thai with a chopstick, clearly trying to work up the nerve. 

“Give it a shot, Paps. You’ll like it.” You urge, once you finally take a break from stuffing your face. Papyrus does so - he’s quite good with chopsticks actually - and then beams at the table as he chews. You wonder where the food actually goes, since it doesn’t drop out of his skull, but only briefly. Magic, blah blah blah. “Good?”

“IT’S LIKE A MEATBALL! BUT MADE OF BEANS AND FRIED AND SWEET AND NOTHING LIKE A MEATBALL!” Papyrus exclaims. You grin, and watch Undyne meticulously removing every single scrap of fish from the bones of her whole red snapper, a slightly feral look on her face. If you didn’t know Undyne so well, you’d say it was a little scary, but the truth was that Undyne simply brought to meals the same enthusiasm she brought to everything else. And, well, Alphys clearly thought it was attractive. You’d noticed that the dinosaur had missed her own mouth and spilled pineapple fried rice on herself a few times, too busy watching Undyne eat.

Sans and Mettaton were merely watching. Mettaton, being a robot, had plugged himself into the wall, though, so that meant that there was only one person to worry about. “Have some food. Or a drink, or _something_.” You tell Sans. He grimaces. 

“already had something today.” He mutters. Oh, that makes you anxious. 

“Please?” You murmur. “You’re gonna wear yourself-”

“to the bone, yeah, yeah.” Sans laughs tiredly. “fine, want to pass me that chili sauce?” You do so, biting your lip and watching him. God, you just want him to be okay, but he barely consumes anything as it is. You know monsters are different, but Papyrus is a skeleton too, and he loves eating. Sans seems to like the cooking part of it fine, but… He notices you watching, and takes a big, pointed gulp of the sweet chili sauce. You relent, and turn back to your noodles.

“So, you’re gonna talk to some people tomorrow morning?” Undyne says, picking her teeth with a stray fishbone and reaching for her beer. You nod, glancing at Mettaton. 

“That’s what Mettaton thinks.”

“We get in front of the story.” Mettaton says knowledgably. “Let them all fall in love with ________ before anyone can come up with anything bad to say against her.”

“what bad things could there even be?” Sans snorts. “got any skeletons in your closet, babe?” You and Papyrus both give him a long look, as Sans glances expectantly around, waiting for anyone to make the obvious joke. The silence draws on. “okay, okay, striking out today.” Sans snickers, taking another sip. You run your hand through your hair, shaking your head. 

“Not that I can think of. I really _am_ this boring.” You admit. “Um, I suppose they could point out that I don’t have any friends - any real human friends.” You correct quickly, when Undyne narrows her eyes at you. You’re not ready for another pep talk. “Or… god, I really don’t know.” You steal a sip of wine from Mettaton’s glass absently - he hasn’t been drinking it, just using it as a very dramatic prop - then glance at Alphys, who’s been squirming slightly. 

“I-I um, I’m j-j-just sorry, I’ve b-been beating myself up all d-day.” She stammers, rubbing the back of her neck. “I, um, I d-didn’t even think about f-f-fires, I didn’t th-think anyone would ever…” She trails off and stares down at her plate. 

“Hey. Alphys, you did great.” You say quickly. “Seriously. I know I wouldn’t feel safe sleeping in this house at all if it weren’t for you. Why would we ever think that someone would firebomb the damn topiaries-” You can hear Sans make a soft sound, like he’s holding in a laugh, and you glare at him before continuing. “I mean, it’s ridiculous, you know?” She takes a deep breath and nods. 

“W-well I built these t-turrets, um, but I don’t think… um, with all the r-reporters out there, we s-shouldn’t…” She says reluctantly. 

“YES. IF HUMANS SEE A TRAP IN ADVANCE, THEY ARE MUCH MORE LIKELY TO AVOID IT.” Papyrus says. “WHEN HARRY AND MARV ATTACKED THE HUMAN KEVIN, HE WON BECAUSE HE MAINTAINED THE ELEMENT OF SURPRISE!” His eyes narrow. “WE SHOULD SMASH UP ORNAMENTS FOR THEM TO STEP ON.” He offers. “AND HEAT UP THE DOOR HANDLE!” He looks elated, the lights in his eyes bright enough that for a second you think he’s going to snap and access some hidden font of magic, the same way Sans does. In the end, all Papyrus ends up doing is descending into a fit of “NYEH HEH HEH”s that practically shake the dining table. 

“you’re a really bad influence on him.” Sans says wryly, nudging you with his shoulder. You roll your eyes at him. 

“Well, you’re a really bad influence on _me_.” Sans shrugs, but doesn’t deny it. He still has that smug look in his eyes that you’re one thousand percent sure is hickey related. “And, uh, I don’t think those traps work as well in real life, Paps. You know, in general, we humans don’t set too many traps. I think it’s actually illegal.” You say with a guilty grin. 

“WHY?!” Papyrus says, astonished. You shrug. 

“Well, what if the wrong person set them off? I’d feel awful if some kid decided to walk on the property and got hurt.” You say. “I was only cool with the window, uh, lasers?” You glance at Alphys, wondering if there’s a technical term, but she merely shrugs. “Anyway, those were only fine because they just stun. Even so, I’m a little worried about some kid getting hurt.”

“So tender-hearted, darling, the audience is going to eat you up tomorrow!” Mettaton sighs, snatching his glass of wine back and making a broad gesture of approval with it. You groan softly, and set yourself back on the course of finishing your noodles as Sans looks seriously at Mettaton. 

“and this, uh, plan. this is definitely going to take the heat off ________, right? this isn’t your way of launching her entertainment career?” He says pointedly. Mettaton looks so insulted that you wonder if Sans might be right to ask that.

“Of course not!” He says. “Oh, you think so little of me, and I’ve done absolutely nothing to prompt it!” He turns to the rest of the table to try to garner their support. Undyne raises an eyebrow. Alphys ducks her head. Papyrus anxiously glances away. And Lesser Dog (under the table, chewing on a rawhide) makes a sound that sounds an awful lot like a laugh. “Heartless, all of you.” Mettaton sighs, holding the wine up to his lips like he’s taking a big sip. “Rest assured, I want nothing more than to see __________ achieve all her dreams, and if she wants to be in charge of a small regional aquarium in her hometown and never know the rush and excitement of fame or the glamour of Manhattan or the dazzling experience of walking a catwalk in Paris, then that dream is… worth… pursuing.” It sounds almost painful for him to say this, and you’re trying very hard not to laugh before he’s halfway through. 

“Thanks, Mettaton. You make my career sound so exciting.” You say, grinning. 

“Oh, think nothing of it darling.” He says, taking the comment genuinely. “Yes, Papyrus?” Papyrus is waving his hand in the air like a schoolboy. 

“IT WOULD PROBABLY BE A GOOD IDEA IF WE WATCHED THE NEXT HOME ALONE NOW. FOR … UH, NOT FOR TRAP IDEAS!” He says innocently. You glance at Sans, who looks up at the sky for guidance before nodding. 

“sure, bud. let’s get this stuff cleaned up first though, huh?” He grabs an armful of aluminum takeout containers, almost all empty, and totes them into the kitchen. Papyrus, who has much bigger arms, scoops literally everything else up and follows his brother. The second they’re out of sight, Undyne gives you an enormous, very pointy grin, and points at your neck. Alphys lets out a quiet little giggle, then ducks her head.

“You should tell us all about it.” Undyne says sweetly.

“No!” You protest, blushing furiously. 

“B-but we can’t d-draw it if-”

“SHHH!” Undyne hisses at her girlfriend, drawing her finger across her neck in the universal sign for ‘zip it.’ Oh, god.

“That wasn’t a joke? You’re _seriously_ drawing a manga about me?” You hiss, narrowing your eyes at them and leaning forward. 

“Oh, it’s very good so far.” Mettaton assures you sweetly. “A bit Sans heavy, nothing that can’t be changed going forward.” You stare at him. 

“...This is it. This is what losing my mind feels like.” You mutter, shaking your head. “Give me that wine.” 

“But, darling-”

“Mettaton.” He sighs dramatically, and passes the wine glass over to you. 

“I’m getting my own.” He says, watching you drain it, and stalks off with all the affronted dignity of a cat who’s been given a bath. 

\------------------------------------

You have to stop glaring at Undyne and Alphys when Sans and Papyrus return; you’re too embarrassed to have to explain why you’re so out of sorts, so instead you put on a big, fake smile, and devote yourself to finishing the bottle of wine as you set up Home Alone 2 for Papyrus. You don’t remember buying this or putting it in the fridge; Mettaton must have discovered your parents’ wine cellar the last time he was over, which you can’t really bring yourself to care about. It’s good that someone’s using all the stuff in the house, at last, even if that someone is a robot who reads weird mangas about you and doesn’t even drink the wine he’s poured -

“something on your mind?” Sans drawls from the cushion next to you. You realize you’re glaring again, and shrug. 

“Nothing major.” You say, and lean back against his arm - he certainly tends to do that whenever possible, sling his arm around your shoulders. You like it, you think, your cheeks feeling hot again. He was going way out of his way to make it clear that he was with you - well, yeah, see: the embarrassing bruise on your neck for further details. Still, embarrassing or not, it was nice. Reassuring. It didn’t feel like he was treating you like an object, honestly, not like a few of the boys in your abbreviated dating history had acted. It just felt like, well, that he wanted the whole world to know that you’d picked him. 

Ugh, if Undyne and Alphys showed anyone else that manga, the whole world legitimately would know. Were they posting it online!?

Nope. Nope. Not worrying about that. You take a deep breath, and lean against his shoulder, smiling at the joy on Papyrus’ face, on Sans’ other side.Papyrus had watched Undyne and Alphys claim the loveseat, then had glanced at Mettaton on the other couch, but Sans had suddenly, excitedly, patted the free cushion next to him, so now Mettaton and Lesser Dog were sharing one, you and the boys sharing the other, much to Sans’ relief. That ‘sexy robot’ comment must have really gotten to him. 

Once Home Alone 2 had finished (and Papyrus had stopped screeching with delight), it was still a little too early for anyone to think about sleeping - particularly you, since you weren’t quite sure if Sans was going to be following you back to your room again and the thought was making you feel nervous and awkward (and a little excited). Mettaton had the remote - well, technically, Mettaton _was_ a remote, and had switched to cable, flickering through the different channels for a glimpse of his face, which the rest of you tolerated patiently. Well, one of you grumbled “narcissist,” but the rest of you were fine with it. Until- 

“Wait! That one was me!” You exclaim, but Mettaton’s already stopped.

“The new poster child for the Monster Acceptance Movement, __________ __________ has been portrayed on television and social media as a friend to all monsters.” The reporter is saying sunnily.

“What.” You’ve got a sinking feeling in your stomach, noticing that the channel Mettaton has stopped on isn’t the news, but rather a notorious gossip channel. 

“Now,” The reporter continues, “recent photos indicate that _________ might be a little bit more than friendly when it comes to our guests from the underground!” 

And there they are. Photos, through the kitchen window, from a distance, of you and Sans. Unmistakably looking much more than friendly. “Oh, god.” You mutter, feeling hollow. 

“fuck.” Sans says, distractedly putting up a hand to cover Papyrus’ eyes. Everyone else is silent, frozen in shock, perhaps, as it cuts back to the pretty reporter. Except, not just the reporter. 

“NO!” You hear yourself shout, and you clap your hands to your mouth, feeling sick to your stomach, as the reporter continues. 

“Here to discuss this turn of events with us, is __________’s aunt and, until recently, legal guardian, Paula. Paula, how are you this evening…”

“Well, disappointed, for one.” Her voice makes you jump. Oh, god, you can’t do this, this is everything awful at once, seeing her sitting there, all dolled up, like she knows you, like she has the fucking right-”

“Uh, I gotta… I gotta…” You take a deep, panicked breath, then stand up, walking quickly through the house, outside, into the backyard, into your safe haven-

The flashbulbs begin to go off instantly, the second you’re more than a step outside. You stand there frozen, the snow falling on your bare arms, as they snap picture after picture of you. 

You can’t do this, and you’ve waited too long.

There’s nowhere to run anymore.


	25. In Which It Turns Out That You're Pretty Good At Sick Aunt Burns

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey friends! I missed you!  
> Uh, I mean...  
> sh-shut up. I don't need u. 
> 
> (I do). 
> 
> FUN STUFF:
> 
>  
> 
> [A CoBC Reader Interpetation!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136393886891/samara-the-night-my-stupid-version-of-reader)
> 
>  
> 
> [Not AT ALL CoBC Fanart, But Basically TST's Mental Image of Many Sans Expressions](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136213355296/fiji-firefox-bleh-i-cant-stoop-drawing)
> 
>  
> 
> Also check out [my tumblr](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com), where we can learn fun things, like that TST will build a skeleton themed fort at her friends' house basically just if you send her an ask telling her to.

You don’t know how long you stand there, staring, dead eyed, into darkness. The bursts of light from the constantly firing flashbulbs create afterimages, green blobs lingering in your vision even when you finally screw your eyes shut. You can’t cry. You know, on some level, that she’ll be watching you, and you always had that one rule, after she’d berated you for crying too often after your parents’ funeral; you weren’t allowed to cry. You couldn’t make your legs work, couldn’t make your brain decide where you even wanted to run, couldn’t even yell, but you could manage not to cry.

“________?” Sans’ voice is soft, even as he approaches the open door to the backyard. How does he always know exactly where to find you? Then again, he’d seen you take off before, and found you out on the beach, so maybe he just knew this was where you went when you got the impulse to run. 

He clearly was not expecting your... company. You hear a noise, halfway between a quick intake of breath and a snarl.

As you turn to look at him, the universe splits open behind you.

Sans is silhouetted in the back door, and the furious, focused look on his face, only visible because of the glow from his eye, it would be enough to scare you on its own - but you can already _feel_ the tearing behind you. You turn back, quickly, to face that awful feeling, backing up almost involuntarily - your legs are finally working to carry you away, and you’re not sure if you’re going to his side, or just scrambling away from the horror.

He’d made a door before, a neat, orderly passage between Grillby’s and your house. This was nothing of the sort. This was a gash, a tear, something that _should not be,_ and the air was thrumming with the feeling of existence unravelling at the seams.

It was the kind of hole that several people could have fallen through at once. 

There were, you notice, no more photographers in your backyard.

“Sans.” You whisper, staring at the rip in the middle of the air. This is nothing like that doorway from one familiar location to another. There was nothing familiar on the other side of that hole. You could barely look at it; your eyes weren’t designed to see colors or shapes like that. Nothing was supposed to move like the things on the other side of that terrible hole in reality moved. And god, the smell, god, god it was the reek of simple, distilled fear, of things rotting, of things falling apart - the word _entropy_ bubbles up from some barely functioning corner of your brain, and then sticks there, stuttering in your head like a skipping CD. “Sans. Bring them back.” You breathe, unable to tear your eyes away.

“why.” He whispers, not meeting your eyes, staring into the tear alongside you. It’s getting bigger, you think. Something’s shifting in there, and you inhale, thinking that one of the photographers is going to crawl out from that mindbreaking void, but no. As it gets closer, you realize it’s something much, much bigger than a person.

It looks like an enormous skull. A horse, a goat?

“Bring them back, Sans.” You mutter again, your voice feeling weak. Blindly, you reach out, scrabbling for his hand. 

“are you okay?” He whispers. The ragged edges of reality are making you feel ill. “did they-”

“They just took some pictures. They were stupid.” You whisper, feeling relieved when you find his hand, even as that dizzying feeling of magic leaks from his hand, up your arm, your heart beginning to race. “They were greedy. They don’t deserve to be hurt, though.” You can’t think, won’t think, of what might be happening to them in that realm he’s opened up. “Bring them back, Sans.”

“they’re predators.” He spits. “they wanted to make a profit off of how much they could manage to hurt you. people like them should be burning -”

“They’re people. They have families.” You whisper hurriedly. “Parents. Sisters. Brothers.” He inhales harshly. “They made a bad choice.” You murmur. “You don’t have to make one too.” His hand has been so stiff in yours, but slowly, you feel his fingers shift to hold your hand tightly. “This isn’t what I need. We don’t fight this with violence.” You whisper. That hideous skull is turning from you, sliding back into the depths you can’t begin to understand. “Bring them back.”

“‘m sorry.” He whispers, and your heart fills with dread for a moment, thinking he’s refusing. But, no, there’s a cracking sound, and suddenly the tear in space is gone, and there’s five, gasping humans sprawled on the snow in front of you, all of them in various states of extreme horror. One, a guy who can’t be much older than you, opens his mouth to begin screaming. 

“no.” Sans speaks, quietly but with a world of weight. You’re astonished, the way he manages to snap from despair to calm composure. The guy who’d been about to yell immediately shuts his mouth. “no screaming. no scene. no talking. you’re going to go home, and you’re never coming back.”

“My - my camera-” One of them, a much older man, stutters. Sans suddenly smiles, all pointy teeth and rage, and you shudder. 

“that’s what we call, uh, an occupational hazard, bud. you wander around on someone else’s property, you can’t blame them if you stumble somewhere you _don’t belong._ ” He says cheerfully, terribly dangerously. “guess you lost your cameras. whoops. lesson learned, huh guys?” 

Five shocked heads nod in instant agreement.

“anyway. time to go home. i’ll do you a solid. lemme show you a shortcut.” Sans says, almost lazily, and then they’re gone again, just dropped out of existence.

“Sans!” You say sharply, but he shakes his head. 

“just dropped ‘em out front by their cars. they won’t be coming back.” You nod in horrified agreement, staring out at the empty backyard, at the scuffs and footprints in the snow from the scuffle. “let’s go back inside.”

“Sans.” You whisper. 

“you need to go back inside, you’re not wearing a jacket-” He’s speaking too fast now, sweating slightly.

“Sans. That wasn’t okay.” You whisper. 

“they were hurting you.” He says quickly, the magic fading from him in a wave that you can feel. “i can see it in your soul, they hurt you, ________.” 

“I can take it, I’ve handled worse-”

“you shouldn’t have to! you don’t deserve it!” Sans insists. “i can’t do this anymore, i can’t watch the people i care about be hurt over and over again, i can’t stand back anymore and just watch you all die!” He says desperately. You take a deep breath, and shiver, realizing, suddenly, that this is about much more than paparazzi. 

“Sans.” You say, trying to sound calm and reasonable, even though you feel anything but. “They were just taking pictures. I wasn’t gonna die. They didn’t touch me.” A silence hangs in the air for a painfully long time, then he shudders. 

“i know. i know.” He mutters. “i’m so sorry, _________.” He hesitates, then looks miserably up at you. “fuck. i’m going to miss you.” What?

“Where are you going?!” You say, panic welling back up in your voice. He stares, bewildered, at you. 

“...you’re going to tell me to leave.” He says, as if it’s obvious. You shake your head quickly, but he goes on. “i’m not the guy you thought i was, i’ve done terrible things and now you know it, i know i told you before, but there’s knowing and then there’s _knowing_ , right?” He lets out a hoarse laugh. “i’ve done them over and over and over again. sometimes i think i’m still doing them, down there.” He pants, the light in his eye slightly wild. “that’s the thing, you know, about poking holes in space and time, you end up wearing yourself a little thin. you notice the distortions, the ripples, things begin to play over and over and over. saw a movie kinda like it up here. had the ghostbusters guy in it…” He says, as if this explains everything at once, or anything at all. He’s got a sickly grin on his face, like he’s just successfully argued his way into an undesired result, like you’ll have to, what? Break up with him, kick him on the streets? And what was he even saying?

“Space and time? Wait, time?” You repeat, astonished, then focus. “It’s okay. It’s okay. Come back in.” You squeeze his hand. “Please, baby. It’s over. Nobody’s getting hurt anymore. Come in.” You whisper. He looks up at you, uncomprehending.

“can my brother stay?” He mutters. “he’s better than me, he’ll keep you safe, he’s a better-”

“Sans, I’m not kicking you out. Either of you.” You insist, totally distracted from anything but the thought of him leaving at this point. “You probably shouldn’t have sent those people wherever you sent them. That’s… that’s a bad place for humans, okay? My brain, it … hurts, really.” You say, shuddering. “It hurts like hell to see that, you can’t put people there anymore, it’s too much. I know why you did it, but it’s too awful.” You breathe. “Will you do it next time?”

“not if you say not to.” He answers instantly. You’re not entirely sure you believe him, but right now you don’t care. Everyone always leaves, but you can’t let this one go, not without a fight. For once, you’re genuinely, fully, truly ready to fight to keep someone with you. 

“Okay. We’re on the same page. I know you were just trying to protect me. If I need your help again, I know you’ll be more careful. No reason for anyone to leave. I need you to stay. I don’t know how this has all happened so fast, but it’s true, and it scares me, but… it’s _true_.” You stress. “I need you in my life.” You say, your voice stronger than you feel. You still want to panic, to scream about everything, but you have to hold off on that, because this is important. Nobody leaves, you tell yourself. This time, nobody was going to leave. 

This long silence is the most excruciating one yet. 

“thank you.” He whispers, and turns to hold you, his arms tight around your waist. You rest your head against his, trying to catch your breath. “i’m so sorry. i’m so sorry.” He mutters.

“Don’t go.” You mumble against his skull. “You don’t have to be that guy anymore, Sans. You don’t have to hurt anyone. I can help you, we can be a team, okay? We’ll watch out for each other?” You say, pulling away to look down at him. 

“okay. okay.” He breathes.

“C’mon. Let’s get out of here. Nobody will be sneaking around after all _that_ , anyway. It’ll be fine. It’ll be okay.” You tell him (and yourself) reassuringly. “And you didn’t really hurt them, right?”

“not really.” He whispers. “they’ll have some pretty bad nightmares, i’m sure, but…” He shakes his head slowly, releases you from the hug, and, still holding your hand, guides you inside. 

They’ll have some bad nightmares, huh?

Well… so will you.

 

\---------------------------

Inside, back in the kitchen, he looks uncertainly at you when your legs, which had been doing so well at carrying you back inside your house, suddenly lose their resolve and you stop in your tracks. You grit your teeth. 

“Is she… still on TV?” You mutter, thinking, at last, of what had made you so upset in the first place. “What did she say?”

He shakes his head. 

“she started saying some, uh, really bad shit. they cut away to a different story.” He mutters. “probably really regretting inviting her on in the first place.”

“Good.” Fuckers. Those absolute slimy fuckers. “Is everyone still here?” It seems impossible, somehow, that all your friends could still be sitting in the TV room, that they hadn’t noticed the universe unravelling, but Sans nods. 

“yeah. paps is, uh, kindly sharing some more of his rooms. nobody wants to go anywhere tonight. everyone’s pretty worried about you.” He says softly. You groan quietly, and he quickly says, as eager to please as a puppy, “i’ll ask ‘em to go, okay? whatever you need.”

“No! No.” You say, a little too loud. “They’re all welcome to stay here whenever they want. I like having them around. I just feel terrible, they’re all spending so much time trying to keep me in one piece…”

“you’re only having problems because of us.” Sans says quietly, the guilt visible on his face. “we’d stay even if we hated you, nobody deserves this. but we don’t hate you. exact opposite.” He whispers. You shake your head. 

“It’s nobody’s fault but the assholes who’ve decided that monsters don’t deserve everything humans do.” You mutter, slumping against the counter and feeling absolutely exhausted. “That’s it, Sans. It’s not on you guys. Especially not you.”

“if i hadn’t been so… you know. if i hadn’t been so obvious-” His eyes are on your neck. You grit your teeth. 

“Hey. No. I’m not hiding this. They can take pictures of me if they want. They can interview my aunt until they all finally realize she’s just a huge pile of shit in a human skin.” You say. He smirks, in spite of himself. “This isn’t a bad thing, us.” You plow onwards. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. It isn’t _wrong_. And you know what? I’d take it all on, anything they could possibly throw at me, if it meant that I could still be friends with Undyne and Paps and Alphys and L.D. and Mettaton and Frisk and Queen Toriel, and especially you.” You say, then let out an exhausted laugh. “God, did you hear that? Did you hear how many people I just said? A month ago, I had _nobody,_ and now there’s all these people, all these people I care about, and I’m not giving that up for anything, Sans.” 

He looks seriously at you. “i’m not sure i deserve all that.” He mutters. 

“Well, I am.” You say, clearly and stubbornly. He sighs, and reaches up to run his fingers through your hair. 

“i’ve said i’m sorry, right?” He says. “cuz, uh, i went out to take care of you, and it seems like you’re doing your best to keep me in one piece right now instead. uh, relatively speaking.” You close your eyes, leaning into his hand, knowing that you should be scared of someone who can just open a door to your worst nightmares and feeling slightly surprised that you aren’t. 

“It’s okay. Things got out of control.” You say, and hang on for that moment, feeling his fingers twine through your hair and trying not to think of your aunt, or the door he’d opened, or the papparazi, or that humiliating picture of you, or anything. “Can we go somewhere tomorrow? Somewhere that isn’t here?” You whisper. “Some stores, maybe? I need to get Christmas presents for you boys and … heh, everyone else too. I didn’t know I’d have so many friends this Christmas.” 

“yeah. definitely.” Sans assures you. “i don’t know if you still want to talk to the press tomorrow-”

“I do.” You say quickly. “If Paula’s going to trash me on TV, I’m going to show the world what a terrible person she is. I just… god, I feel so bad for her kid, I almost don’t want to do it. I guess, you know, assuming she ever had it. Last I saw of her before this, she was about six months pregnant, so probably, but…” You shrug. “It’s weird. I’ve got some cousin out there I’ve never met. My only family, besides Paula.” You yawn, drooping slightly. Sans frowns. 

“you gotta get some sleep.” He says. You hesitate, then nod. “go on up to bed, babe. i’ll make sure that everything’s all taken care of down here, see that everyone finds a bed that needs one.” He murmurs. He seems so calm now, it’s hard to believe that it wasn’t that long ago that he was dissolving space itself. 

“Okay.” You yawn again, then kiss his forehead softly, wobbling slightly as you push yourself off the counter. 

“you gonna make it up there okay?” Sans checks quickly. You smile and nod.

“I’m a big girl, I can handle a flight of stairs.” You assure him. 

“k. i’ll be up in a few.” He whispers, and squeezes your hand. Oh. You make a game effort at trying to figure out if that’s awfully presumptuous, but it turns out that all you feel is relieved. 

“Okay. See you.” You say, and tiredly stumble down the hall and up the stairs, opening the door to your room. While Sans is gone, you quickly change into your favorite pair of sleep shorts and a tank top, then curl under the covers, switching off the lights. Ghost is gone somewhere - maybe hanging out with Papyrus - so for the moment it’s just you. For the first time in a long time, actually, it seems. You close your eyes, and those awful shifting shapes and colors fill your vision almost immediately. You jerk back, opening your eyes instantly, and turn the bedside lamp back on at once. For nearly ten minutes, you lie there, trying not to think about the void, staring at your cellphone or the wall or anything that’ll distract you. 

The door creaks open, and Sans peeks in. 

“hey.” 

“Hey!” You’re too eager to have another person there. 

“you’re still up. thought you were tired?”

“I tried. But I kept seeing…”

“shit. sorry, kid.” He pads over, closing the door behind him. He hesitates by the side of the bed, and you give him a crooked smile. 

“Go on. Hop in. I think I’ll be able to sleep if you’re with me.” You yawn. He looks surprised, then immensely pleased, then immediately tries to hide both of those things, but you can still see them in his eyes before he turns the light out and climbs in behind you. Oh, it’s better, having a big spoon, even if your big spoon is both A) a little shorter than you are and B) pretty damn bony. Still, when he throws his arm over your waist, you feel relieved more than anything else, and snuggle up against him, almost immediately feeling more secure. 

“night, babe.” Sans murmurs in your ear. You sigh, then whisper,

“Hey. Sans. What was that place, that door you opened? Where was that?” 

You feel the hesitation in his touch as he pulls you unconsciously closer to him.

“uh. that was…” He waits for a long moment, then finally whispers, “where i came from. that was my old home.”


	26. In Which You Have Casual No Big Deal Just A Normal Light Conversation Before Bed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi kiddos  
> have fun at skooool tomorrow (for those of you who are going to school tomorrow, suckas)  
> and make sure to write all your book reports on CoBC.  
> Love,  
> TST

“That place… That was your home?” You say, shocked, and practically tangle yourself in sheets and bony legs as you turn to look at him.

“uh. yeah. kinda.” Sans says, wincing. “sorry. too weird, i know.” You just blink at him.

“How…” You finally attempt, trying to wrap your mind around someone like Sans existing in a place like that. “What, where…” You try, then shake your head. Sans takes a deep breath. By the faint light of the nearly full moon, you can see him weighing his words.

“remember the other day, we talked about how i make shortcuts?” He mutters. You nod, moving your hand from under the covers to copy the demonstration he’d given you, stretching your finger and thumb apart as far as they would go, and then making a circle with them. He nods. “right. you sure you want to talk this through now, you don’t need to sleep?” You let out a soft laugh. 

“I am wide awake.” You say, a little wryly. He nods, his head still resting on the pillow. 

“k. thought i’d ask. so, i told you i made a doorway, right? punched a hole in the space between point a and point b.”

“Right.” You confirm, looking at the circle your pointer finger and thumb are still forming. He notices this, and nods to himself, then reaches up to trace your pointer finger and thumb softly with one bony finger.

“are these two points, your finger and your thumb, are they touching each other?” He asks you, and you blink, because it’s such a silly question.

“Of course.” 

“no, but are they? if i got the strongest microscope in the world, the universe, so i could look down and see the smallest parts of your finger-”

“Like the atoms, or um, the protons and neutrons and electrons? The, um, what’s the smaller one than that, the quarks? Gluons?” You mutter, staring at your fingers. 

“you humans know about all that?” Sans sounds so pleased that you have to look away from your hand to meet his eyes. He blushes slightly, a faint glow in the darkness. “not that i thought you wouldn’t, i’ve been reading, but most monsters don’t know much about that stuff, i basically only have alphys to talk science with these days…” You feel yourself smiling, which you almost can’t believe. 

“I don’t know much more than what I learned in high school. I was always more into the biological sciences, we don’t go that much smaller than, like, protein interactions or maybe DNA and RNA, so it’s molecular structure but not so small as single atoms, you know?”

“uh, i don’t.” He says, but he’s wearing a big grin now. “i really don’t. you want to, maybe, teach me about it sometime?” You feel, for about the thousandth time this day, astonished. 

“Do you really want me to?”

“very much.” He says, absolutely sincerely. “i want to learn everything about what makes you work.” You burst out laughing, surprised.

“Uh, I don’t think we’ll get too much of an understanding into my inner workings talking about organic chem.” You say, and are rewarded by an eyeroll. “Sure. We’ll go through it sometime, I’ve got all my textbooks somewhere. I hope I can remember half of it.”

“thank you.” He says, looking as thrilled as a kid who’s been told they’re going to Disney World. Then he remembers what he was talking about, and his expression falls. “anyway.” He plows on, and you bite your lip, remembering what he was explaining. “so, you feel your fingers touching, you see your fingers touching, but you get down on a small enough level, and they’re not touching at all. they’re atoms pushing back against each other through, uh, systems that don’t mean that they need to physically touch each other. they’re separated by space that’s almost impossible to comprehend, but it’s there. the space between the two points.” He whispers. You nod. He takes a deep breath, and again, seems to be considering if he really wants to talk about this. 

“my old man, uh, gaster. was his name. w.d. gaster. he was the royal scientist, down below, in the underground. asgore appointed him because he was smart, and he never gave up, and most importantly, because he figured out how to use magic and science together.” Sans mutters, his eyes looking distant. 

“dad figured out how to do it, how to poke holes in space. he built a… machine, i guess. he couldn’t open up doors on his own, so he built something that could, used his magic and science and tried to open a door past the barrier.” He shakes his head. “but whoever set up that barrier, damn, they knew their stuff. no shortcuts there. so he opened up something else entirely. like pushing a needle through fabric that’s glued to a steel wall. you don’t end up on the other side. you just get stuck in the fabric. that’s the thing, there’s no such thing as a doorway, there’s just tunnels, when you think about it. there’s always some space between. and gaster figured out, by accident, how to access that space.” 

“And that’s what you opened tonight? That’s where you came from?” You say, trying to wrap your head around it. He nods, then grimaces, then shrugs. 

“things live in that space. well. live isn’t the right term, but they exist. you saw one of them tonight, huh?”

“That… skull, that huge thing?” You say, your stomach squirming slightly as you remember it. Sans nods.

“heh, yeah. that guy’s actually a little more like a pet. gaster trained four or five of ‘em. think he got bored, but they’ve got this beam attack, dad called it the ‘gaster blaster’ - i know, it’s ridiculous. maybe he thought that they could take the barrier down. i dunno. he spent a lot of time in the space between, and it kinda rubbed off on him. he started looking more and more like the folks that live there. you know.” He grimaces. “uh, bony.” 

“It changed him?” You whisper. 

“you know what they say. stare too long at the void, the void makes you into a goddamn skeleton.” Sans says, very dryly. You’re pretty sure that’s not exactly the saying. “but, hey, he didn’t care. he thought he was onto something. hell, he was sure of it. he thought he was always just a day or two away from finding a way past the barrier, and he explored deeper and deeper in there. and i guess, one day, he found me.” He pauses, and studies you again. “you sure this isn’t too heavy?”

“No. Please.” You murmur. He nods. 

“k. i haven’t really, you know, talked this out. not in a long time.” Sans whispers. “anyway, what he found out there wasn’t really me. it was a… i wish i knew. a baby _something_. a baby something that looked an awful lot like a human skeleton. i mean, he had quite a few of those to look at, thanks to our king. not surprised i got him interested. anyway, a discovery like that required further experimentation, obviously. he just picked me up, took me back to the lab, and got to work.” You inhale sharply, reaching up to trace his face unconsciously. 

“What did he do? Did he hurt-”

“don’t really know. i was a babybones. little guy. he must have done _something_ pretty big, because i spent a lot of time in the void, and i’ve never met anyone like me or papyrus. see, once i was old enough, dad thought, once i got my magic under control enough, he thought someone like me would be able to do what he couldn’t, that i’d be the one able to make that damn hole through the barrier. he tried to make a successor, i suppose. his best invention. he was definitely losing it a little by then. i think it broke him, when he realized that i could open a door damn near anywhere, no sweat, but i couldn’t get past that border any more than he could.” He shakes his head incrementally. 

“i let him down. big time. i think that’s when i went back to being an experiment in his mind, not a son. he tried again, went back, found paps, but his heart wasn’t in it, and he gave up almost right away. i had no idea i even had a brother until gaster plopped him in my arms and told me that he was gonna be the best human collector the underground had ever seen, and that one of his sons, at least, was going to set us all free. and then, well, i basically stepped in to raise up papyrus. i ran errands for asgore for a while, we’d met plenty of times when dad gave progress reports. saved up enough money, started renting our home in snowdin, got out of the lab and the heat. dad kept working, barely noticed we weren’t around much at all, me and paps. he thought he’d had the right idea before he found me, that he just needed to finetune his machine, just had to open the right door.” Sans rubs his head. “the old bastard finally did. he’d opened a door to the space between, when he found me and paps. but that wasn’t enough. he managed to do something i can’t do. he opened a door to _nothing_. a place even i couldn’t stand to look at. dark as anything. darker yet darker.” He whispers, then closes his eyes, looking pained.

“he opened a door to a place there was no coming back from. _**and he stepped through.**_ ” 

His tone makes you shiver, an uncontrollable instinctive reaction, and he feels it. His eyes open up again, and he whispers, “shit, babe, sorry. i knew it. it’s a lot to take in.”

“Oh, god, Sans.” You breathe. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine. I’ve been sitting here, whining, because my aunt took off, and you… god. What a terrible…”

“he wasn’t all bad.” Sans mutters. “just blind to everything but his goals. still. he gave me papyrus, you know? probably saved my life too, i was feeling so awful. i tried to go back, even, back to the void, to stay. lasted a few hours, but i didn’t belong there and i knew it. you know what they say. you can’t go home.” He shakes his head, sounding exhausted. You wonder how much telling you all this took out of him. 

“but i had paps. so everything ended up okay. we got out. gaster was right. if i hadn’t seen frisk, if papyrus hadn’t protected them, if undyne hadn’t been papyrus’ friend, maybe the barrier never would have fallen. he picked out two sons who would help bring it down. bastard was right the whole time.” His voice sounds thick, and without thinking, you curl against him, wrapping your arms around him, stroking his back, feeling the bump of each rib under his t-shirt. 

“You did perfect, Sans. You did perfect.” You whisper. “I’m just so sorry you had to go through all that.”

“it was worth it, to get up here.” He says quietly, moving so he can see you. “it was all worth it, to see… the sun.” He says, but his eyes have that distant quality, the one you recognize, the one where he’s looking through you to see something you can’t, and you suspect suddenly, with a hot rush of emotion, that he’s not talking about the sun at all, that he’s staring through you to see that thing he’d called an immutable fact; your soul. There are times Sans is a good liar, after all, but this is not one of them. 

Your heart begins to hammer roughly in your chest as you grasp the magnitude of that compliment.

“The sun?” You repeat, feeling like an idiot. 

“heh. uh. not just the sun.” He whispers, his cheeks flushed, his eyes determined and still fixed on that point you can't see. And he reaches out, doesn’t even touch you, and something happens inside you, you’re not sure what, something that’s always been close and secret and vulnerable is suddenly exposed to the air, as new and sensitive as a, what, a nerve? But it doesn’t hurt, not yet, you just know that it could, oh it could hurt terribly, and you wish you could see what he sees, you wish you could see anything at all, because you just can’t understand, and his face is illuminated by something, some light, but you can’t find the source, and he’s looking at you like you’re the most incredible thing in the entire world. 

“you are so beautiful.” He whispers, and you get the sense that he can see everything, all at once, all your choices, all your scars, your worries and hopes, every cell, every molecule, every atom, the space between those atoms; all the things that make you who you are. And still, it illuminates him.

“Sans…” You whisper, about to move closer again, when he murmurs, 

“can i?” His fingers are outstretched, like they’re hovering just millimeters away from something, and you remember what he had said about your soul, that if he wanted to, he could even touch it, and without thinking, you nod, and he reaches, and your mind.

Just.

Stops.


	27. In Which Mettaton Might Have Accidentally Referenced The First Hunger Games Movie?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahahaha  
> okay
> 
> NOT TRASH MADE BY PEOPLE WHO AREN'T TST: (by the way, you guys do this RIDICULOUSLY fast because I posted chapter 25/26 a hot second ago and you're all ready to go wow wow)
> 
> [HOLY WOW BED CUDDLES](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136613718946/dablahgz-um-based-on-the-fic-chill-or-be)
> 
> [AND COUCH CUDDLES](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136643344756/gwyneko-im-in-love-with-chill-or-be-chilled)
> 
> [I'M BEGINNING TO GET THE SENSE THAT YOU GUYS LIKE CUDDLES](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136657205561/littlemissglitter14-my-fanart-of-the-end)
> 
> ACTUAL TRASH MADE BY TST:
> 
> [THIS IS FOR ALL OF YOU NO EXEMPTIONS](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136581025976/i-want-gaster-to-touch-my-blaster)
> 
> [Okay, this one spiraled out of control but I managed to draw a weird mashup between Mettaton and Jim from The Office, and you guys need to deal with it now](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136593694306/psst-so-i-think-i-will-at-least-attempt-a-fanart)

Three things happen at once.

One: for a flicker, for a brief second, you can see what he’s holding, you can see your soul, and he’s right, it’s a fact, it’s there, it’s real, and he’s caressing it like he can’t imagine a more precious thing.

Two: you feel it, in every single cell of your body, every nerve ending singing ecstatically, every part of you suddenly awake, attuned, and absolutely transfixed by the sensation. You know, now - what had he said, that there’s knowing and then there’s _knowing_ \- that him, touching your soul like that, oh god, he could destroy you, it would take so little effort for him to destroy you… but he’s not. Oh, this is the exact opposite of destruction, this is the opposite of entropy, this is healing, this is order, this is something totally new, and you don’t want it to end, not ever, even though it’s too much, even though you’re sure that nobody should be able to feel this much all at once. 

Three: you start to cry.

You don’t notice that you’re crying; there’s too much else going on. Naturally, he does, almost immediately, and he jerks his hand away like it’s been burnt, and that feeling flickers and fades and your soul, whatever he’d done, it’s over and you’re no longer raw and exposed, it’s back in your chest, back wrapped around your heart like a blanket.

“shit. shit. shit.” He’s muttering, looking anxiously at you. You try to respond, and let out another soft sob, and he looks so furious with himself, and all you can do is hold him tight, curl up against his sternum again and weep. “i’m so sorry.” He’s whispering. “didn’t think it would hurt, shit. shit.” You shake your head desperately and manage a watery,

“D-didn’t hurt. Opposite.” And then it’s right back to sniffing and crying. 

This is horrendously embarrassing, of course. It’s been so long, SO LONG since the last time you cried; every single time, you’ve managed to fight the tears and the emotions back, and now that you’ve found, for the very first time, this exotic new feeling of joy and trust and... that other word you’re very scared to think of, because it’s too soon to talk about that word and you both know it… Anyway, now that you’re feeling better than you have in as long as you can remember, you’re crying! It doesn’t make any sense! 

He’s studying you, now, but the panic’s gone from his expression, and he seems to be calming down. “too much?” He whispers, and you shake your head again. Finally, you find your voice.

“I - I didn’t know anything could feel like that?” You whisper, burying your face in his t-shirt, feeling the bones underneath against your cheek. 

“what was it like?” He asks softly, and the now-familiar feeling of bones sliding through your hair begins, his fingers soothing on your scalp. You let out a watery laugh, and whisper,

“Like everything was perfect. Oh, god, I don’t know. I wish I could say, I don’t have the right words.”

“i have an idea.” He murmurs, and you look up at him. His hand still moves through your hair as you ask,

“Did it feel like something to you?” He looks at you reverently, and nods.

“hell yes. god… yes.” He whispers. “it was like… i’ve never… i mean…” His brow furrows, trying to come up with what it had been like. Finally, he sighs, and shrugs, resigned to the limits of language you’re both bumping up against. “told you before. it’s a _very good soul._ ” He whispers, and you sigh softly, tucking your head under his chin, your sniffles finally subsiding. All of a sudden, all your exhaustion has crept back into your bones, and your eyelids are already drooping, and you still can’t believe you’ve cried, but he hasn’t teased you or anything, so maybe it’s okay. 

“Sans…” You murmur. 

“‘m sorry. ‘s been a really long day, huh?” He whispers. 

“Don’t be sorry. It was amazing. Next time… maybe I’ll not cry.” You laugh tiredly. “It was just so _much._ Didn’t know anything could feel like that.”

“next time?” He says, sounding like he can barely believe it. You simply nod, and he pulls up the blankets around you, and then you’re asleep, just like that. 

You don’t have nightmares, exactly. You dream about a boy who’s never felt like he belonged anywhere and a girl who’s missed her family so much, and a man stepping into nothingness and being swallowed, and that beautiful, golden feeling of being (oh, hell, you’re asleep, you can think the word now)… that feeling of being loved.

\-----------------------------------

“Well, if it isn’t my sleeping beauties!” Your eyes fly open and you gasp, ready for the next terrible thing. Sans makes a profoundly irate noise, pulling you closer - hm, you must have flipped sometime, because he’s being the big spoon again.

“mettaton. pal.” Sans is saying, and you recognize that calm, casual, almost joking tone as the same one that he’d used on the reporters last night. “you gotta knock.” Uh oh. 

“Sans…” You say, a little warningly, then look up at Mettaton, who’s hovering in the doorway with a just barely obnoxious smile on his face, though it drops when he realizes that maybe you, like Sans, aren’t exactly thrilled with his uninvited presence in your room at… you squint at your clock and groan, 6:30(!) in the morning. 

“But I did knock, darlings!” He says, leaning dramatically against the doorjamb. Jeez, you’re happy to see that yesterday certainly didn’t take the wind out of his sails. “You didn’t answer, and I was worried!” 

“did you?” Sans is drawling. “was it the world’s quietest knock? because you’d think that those metal knuckles on that oak door-”

“That door is _mahogany!_ ” Mettaton interrupts. You blink at him, and are about to open your mouth to ask if he knows he’s making a reference, but suddenly you notice that there is a, er… _bone_ that DEFINITELY wasn’t there last night pretty comfortably nestled up against your butt, and just as abruptly all you can do is blush the brightest shade of red you’ve ever blushed, and thank every single deity you can possibly think of that there’s a blanket between you and Sans and Mettaton’s prying gaze. 

“the type of wood is not relevant.” Sans is saying, his face half buried in your hair. “is there an emergency, pal?” Mettaton glares daggers at him, then clears his throat. 

“________, sweet, whenever you’re ready, you’re needed in wardrobe.”

“Wardrobe?” You squeak. 

“You do still want to talk to the press, right, love?” Mettaton says. “We’ve got a ten AM slot, so that simply doesn’t give us much time.”

“Oh! Uh! Right!’ You say quickly. Mettaton looks at you strangely. 

“Is… everything alright?”

“YUP! Fine! See you downstairs!” You say, all in a rush. He raises an eyebrow at you, nods, and very, very slowly closes the (mahogany?) door. Once you hear his footsteps clanking down the stairs, you turn cautiously to look at Sans, and then sigh softly at that shiteating grin he is sporting as he takes in your blush. 

“something bothering you?” He says, suddenly way too cheerful and innocent. 

“Um. Are you a little _excited_ about something?” You drawl pointedly. He fails to contain an evil snicker, then slaps the innocent look right back on his face. 

“you know biology. just a thing that happens to guys in the morning.” He replies, painfully casual, though the jerk is obviously amused by how flustered you are.

“I know it’s a thing that happens to _human_ guys. But last I checked, skeletons, um… lack the requisite…”

“maybe _human_ skeletons do.” He says, copying your tone. Then, the most casually yet, he adds “you know, if you’re curious-”

“Ha! Nice try.” You say, finally giving in and laughing, shaking your head as you slide away from his hold and climb out of bed. You hate to think it, but you’re a bit relieved. You’d been wondering how that was going to work out. And you were also, shit, more than a bit curious, but if Mettaton said you were going to be on camera in three and a half hours, that curiosity would have to be, uh… indulged at some other point. Sans doesn’t move, but he pouts at you - oh, that was a new move - until you lean over and kiss him slowly. After that, he’s all smiles. 

“wanna wake me up when the sun’s actually up?” He asks, his eyes already sliding shut again. 

“Sure!” You promise sunnily. 

You’re totally sending Mettaton to wake him up instead.

\-------------------------------

“You’re sure you’re up for this?” Undyne is pacing nervously in the kitchen.

“Sweetie, sit d-down and eat.” Alphys demands. 

“__________, please try to hold still?”

“I _am_ holding still, Mettaton.”

“don’t see why you need to do that to her hair. i like her hair.”

“No kidding, dork.” 

“Undyne, b-be nice-”

“HUMAN, EAT! WHY ARE YOU NOT EATING!”

“Because if I move Mettaton will-”

“Stop moving!”’

“See?!”

Mornings never used to be like this. 

At least Ghost is happy. He’s in the thick of things, twining around one set of ankles and then the next, begging for pieces of bacon and eggs, purring like a motor. Papyrus had told you excitedly, the second that you came downstairs from your shower (in Mettaton’s chosen, smart yet casual outfit of course), that Ghost had spent all night in his room.

(“THE GRAY CAT SLEPT ON MY PILLOW!” was actually, more specifically, what he’d shrieked at you.)

“Okay, finished! See, darling, was that so hard?” Mettaton sighs. “Now eat. There’s no point in fainting on stage by accident. Only faint on purpose.” 

Oh, these are not great tips. But he’s right, you need food. Careful not to smudge your carefully applied makeup, you begin eating breakfast hurriedly, alternating spoonfuls of cereal with gulps of coffee. 

“Mettaton, you’re sure it’s a good idea to invite the reporters in here?” Undyne says, for perhaps the twentieth time since you came downstairs. 

“Yes! We want a nice, comfortable, relaxed ________. Let’s not worry about sets or green rooms or anything. Besides, everyone’s already seen the outside of the mansion. If ________ wants to discredit her, ugh, aunt, this is the way to do it.” Mettaton’s nose wrinkles at the mention of Paula. Oh, you didn’t know it could do that. “Just imagining that poor little lost girl, all alone, wandering the halls of this mansion all by herself, absolutely tragic, just a kitten and scraps for clothes, reading by the light of a guttering candle-” He trails off, seeing the look you’re giving him. 

“A little dramatic?” You say pointedly. “Don’t, uh, don’t say stuff like that on TV, okay? I wasn’t Oliver Twist or anything.” You can feel the cereal and coffee swimming uneasily in your stomach, and your muscles tensing. Oh, maybe this was a bad idea. 

“You’re gonna do awesome, punk!” Undyne says, seeing the worry on your face, and gives you a (slightly harder than necessary) reassuring punch on the shoulder. Sans glares at her. 

“we all got your back.” He says softly, and you take a deep breath and nod. 

From all the way in the front of the house, the doorbell rings. 

“Oh, that must be them! I’ll see them in!” Mettaton says brightly. You grit your teeth and nod. 

Showtime.


	28. In Which You Have To Promise Not To Say Any Cuss Words

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man, I love you guys.  
> That's all, just... you guys are so great.  
> Sorry about all the cliffy hangz.  
> Sincerely yours,  
> Still Unbearably Smug About The Morningwood Joke in Chapter 27 TST
> 
> FANART ZONE:  
> (great news I didn't draw anything weird this time but also I'm delighted by what I've helped make happen)
> 
> littlemissglitter14 went hogwild today with some fanart, and I have the priv of sharing with u [Mettaton Busting In](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136728071056/littlemissglitter14-yn-holy-fuck-so-many) and a little piece I like to call [GLOW GAME SO STRONG](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136696351681/littlemissglitter14-totalskeletontrash-forgive)
> 
> Have fun sinners.

Their names are John and Sarah. “Like, um. Terminator?” You ask, and are met with two very blank stares, followed by polite laughter that goes on a little too long. You recognize them, of course. They’ve been regional morning hosts for a while, it’s just that, well, you don’t care that much about morning talkshows? And, god, they are just immaculate. Every single hair is perfectly in place. John is probably balding, but his hair is coiffed in such a careful way that it appears he has thick, full locks. Sarah’s hairdo is possibly more incredible - when she walks over to greet you, all blinding smiles, her hair doesn’t move with her; it’s got so much spray in it that it’s practically a helmet. 

They’re as happy as clams, looking around your house, admiring the artwork, being guided deeper into the house by Mettaton, who they seem to know quite well. 

“Right this way, darlings, oh, you’re just going to love it, I thought the best lighting would be by ________’s Christmas tree, oh, it’s just charming.” He’s purring, all smooth showbiz motor, as slick as you’ve ever seen him. You can tell now that he does indeed have an on-camera persona, even if the cameramen, trailing behind you like ducklings, haven’t started shooting yet. You didn’t know Mettaton could get any more… Mettaton. 

“Right, well, we’ll just need a few minutes to set up, and then we’ll get to it!” Sarah says brightly. “Oh, it’s so lovely to finally meet you, ________, we’ve heard such lovely things!” Lovely. 

“Yes, absolutely. And may I say that you have a charming home?” John says. You try to do a normal smile. 

“Heh, thanks. I haven’t been able to do much with the place, since, well… you know.” You mutter. 

“Save it for the camera, darling.” Mettaton murmurs in your ear, pretending to fix a piece of hair, and you glare very briefly at him. You don’t know how to do this! You settle down on the loveseat when Sarah gestures at you to do so, and Mettaton sits next to you. “I’ll be with you all the way.” He says, softly, no longer using his camera voice, and you give him a small smile, watching John and Sarah fussily direct the cameramen to move the other loveseat painfully close, so that you can all be in the shot. You take a deep breath, wishing you could just be in the kitchen with your friends (if they haven’t crept closer to eavesdrop yet). 

Still, you’re doing what needs to be done. God, there’s been so many changes this month, you barely noticed when exactly it was that you hit the tipping point that meant you would take some action. Maybe it was just seeing Paula badmouth you on TV last night, but you’re not entirely sure that’s the case. You feel, well, stronger than you can ever remember feeling, in spite of your nerves, in spite of your fear. It’s like you’ve suddenly grown a backbone - but, no, you always spoke up for other people. You’re just speaking up for yourself, now.

“Okay, ________, so we’ll take it nice and slow. This is going to be live, so no cursing, okay? We’ll have a delay of about fifteen seconds if you slip up, but our censors like it better if they don’t need to worry” John is saying with a friendly smile.

“Oh, gosh. I didn’t even think about that.” You say, feeling flustered, and notice the two anchors exchanging pleased glances with Mettaton. 

“I told you two. She’s the last good girl on earth.” Mettaton laughs brightly. Your mind instantly snaps back to the little situation between you and Sans that morning, wondering if that disqualifies you from ‘good girl’ category, and then do everything in your power not to blush.

“You’re going to do great.” Sarah assures you, settling down on the other loveseat next to John and arranging her blazer carefully. 

“And we’re live in five, four, three…” One of the cameramen calls, counting down the last two seconds on his fingers. 

“And we’re live with Mettaton, and his dear friend _______.” John says, giving the camera a big, white smile, his voice echoing sonorously through the room. “You may have seen the storm of interest generated by Mettaton’s recent interview with ‘Good Morning, Good Morning!’, where he described a series of attacks on his poor friend ________, simply because she had the temerity to be a human who has befriended several monsters.”

Mettaton shakes his head sadly, picking up your hand and holding it between his own.

“I’m afraid that’s true, John. Unfortunately, I’m here with ________ today to talk to you because the situation has only gotten worse.” He breathes. He is _perfect_ , mournful without being maudlin, sincere without being hokey. You want to gape at him; the robot can certainly act! But, well, that wouldn’t look good, so you stick with an appropriately sad expression, nodding at your friend. 

“Can you give us a recap of what’s been going on, _______?” Sarah says kindly, and suddenly, it’s your turn. You take a deep breath, and nod. 

“It’s been… a crazy couple of days.” You say, trying to speak as clearly as everyone else. “Gosh, I hardly know where to begin.” 

“How about your friends?” John suggests. “How did you end up with such a close group of monsters as your circle of friends?” At that, you can’t help but smile. 

“I, um, I work at the aquarium, downtown, near the base of Mt. Ebott.” You say, a little shyly, then begin gathering steam. “I suppose I probably shouldn’t say that, but I know that it’s probably already common knowledge.” You say, glancing at the cameras. “A few months back” (well, that’s pushing it, but there’s already so much that’s strange about this story that you don’t feel like explaining the condensed timeline, and well, technically, you have known Undyne for two months, as long as the end of November and most of December counts as two), “I met a monster named Undyne in the aquarium lobby, who I encouraged to apply for a job. We ended up working together, and she very quickly became my best friend. She’s one of the kindest people I’ve ever met.” You say, smiling in spite of yourself. “I’ve been lucky enough to meet some of my dearest friends through her, including my favorite actor on earth!” Mettaton gives you a billion watt smile, and John and Sarah laugh, this time, genuinely. “And, uh, I feel, honestly, just… so grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to grow so close to them.” You say, glancing away from John and over at the cameras. 

“But not everyone seems to agree with you.” Sarah says, restraining her smile. You sigh, then nod. 

“A few days ago, some vandals broke into my house. They destroyed my car, and made it clear that it was because I was friends with monsters. They actually wrote ‘monster lover’ on it in… what seems to be a bodily fluid.” You say tactfully. Sarah grimaces slightly. “The car is still in the garage, you can check it out if you’re interested. The police seem to be disinterested in investigating.” Both anchors shake their head in simultaneous disapproval. “I thought that was as bad as things were going to get, but then someone actually firebombed my front yard. About half my trees burned down because someone threw a bomb into them. Because of my friends. It’s unbelievable.” You say, sighing. Mettaton squeezes your hand in a way that’s surely supposed to read on camera, and you smile at him. 

“Not only have you been vandalized, but you’ve been maligned on television as well.” John says softly. “I’m not sure if you’re aware, but, last night, a woman purporting to be your Aunt gave an interview that expressed… deep disapproval of your choices.” You nod slowly, feeling Mettaton’s eyes on you. You feel like you need to choose your words very carefully. After all, it’s not just Mettaton and the anchors listening. It’s Paula too. It’s the entire world. 

“I suppose she’s unhappy with me because I'm dating a monster.” You say slowly. You can see, from the corner of your eye, John and Sarah sit up a little straighter. You frown slightly. “Yeah, uh, I suppose someone sold the press my address, and well, I think we’ve all seen the photos already. I mean, they had to trespass on my property and sneak into my backyard and shoot through my window to take those photos.” You can hear the irritation in your voice, and manage to pull it back a little. “Anyway, it seems like some people were very interested in making some money off of taking pictures of me kissing my boyfriend.” Mettaton shakes his head sadly, and you give him a wry look. “And then they have the guts to call _me_ disgusting. It’s ridiculous.” You say. 

“It must be awful.” Sarah says sympathetically, and you thank her mentally for not saying something ugly. 

“It’s embarrassing. And petty. And illegal.” You sigh. “I can’t imagine that any of the people making money off of it would be pleased if someone hid in the bushes taking pictures of them and their boyfriend or girlfriend or whatever.” 

“Regardless of the illegality of those pictures - and based on the facts, Mettaton’s representatives have determined that they’ll be pursuing a solution for you regarding that, starting with a cease and desist,” You glance at Mettaton, trying not to look surprised, and he gives you a tiny smile, “It seems that your Aunt is quite disapproving of your new relationship.” John says gently. You lock eyes with him, feeling your muscles tense. Oh, god, you’re finally going to talk about it, you almost can’t believe it. You’ve hidden this for so long, and now you’re going to tell everyone. 

“Well, she isn’t just my Aunt.” You say softly. “After my parents died, twelve years ago, when I was ten, she was appointed my legal guardian in their will.” Sarah gasps slightly. 

“You’re an orphan?” She says, sounding genuine for once. “But, this beautiful house!” 

“My mom and dad owned EbbCo. The power company.” You explain quietly. “They set aside money for my care, just in case anything happened to them. Unfortunately, they entrusted it to the wrong person. My Aunt Paula, the woman I was supposed to depend on to survive, took off with all the money my parents left me. I’ve never seen a dime, other than the fifty bucks here and there she’d give me to survive on for months at a time. And, since I was fourteen, I haven’t seen her, until last night on TV, anyway.” You say, calm and cold. Both anchors are staring at you now, their mouths hanging open. Even Mettaton looks shocked, and you wonder how much he actually knows - you’d figured Sans must have explained everything last night, but apparently this isn’t the case. 

“...You’re saying she stole your parents’ money?” John finally stammers. 

“I’m saying she stole _my_ money. Millions of dollars.” You say, crisp and clear, looking directly into the cameras now. “I never reported it, never said anything about it, because for the longest time I figured that she was a stupid woman who made a selfish decision, but that I should take the higher road. Now I realize that the higher road doesn’t mean that I let myself get stomped on any longer.” You say, and all three of them nod approvingly, Mettaton still holding your hand tightly. 

“So, I suppose in response, I’ll say this. I can only imagine that she said those things last night because she’s managed to burn through every last dollar she stole from my family, and she’s desperate for cash. If anyone wants to pay her for an interview, I want them to know the kind of person they’re giving money to. She’s the kind of person who would leave a ten year old kid for months at a time, right after her parents died. She’s the kind of person who would hit a ten year old kid for crying too much after she lost everything. She’s the kind of person who would threaten to kill a little girl’s kitten if the little girl didn’t tell the authorities that everything was perfect, after her teacher noticed the bruises and the weight loss from too little food, and the too small clothes, and the dirt.” You say, your voice shaking slightly.

“So, if that’s who you want to give your money to, because you’re so disgusted that I’ve got a boyfriend who happens to be a monster, be my guest, I suppose. But I’m not going to be quiet about it any longer. And to any of you out there who have been trying to terrorize me because of my friends or my boyfriend, I want you to take a hard look at yourselves, and figure out if this is the kind of person you want to be, someone who sees friendship and love and is disgusted by it. You’re no better than her. The real monsters didn’t come from the underground, you know. They’ve always been up here, trying to find the next group to hate because they look or sound or act different.” You say firmly, then suddenly realize how long you’ve been talking and duck your head. 

“Wow.” John says softly. 

“Wow.” Sarah agrees. 

“Wow.” Mettaton echoes. It’s quiet for a moment, then John and Sarah simultaneously get their camera ready smiles back on their faces. 

“Well, that was certainly a moving and beautiful sentiment from a very brave young woman.” John says, still sounding off-kilter. 

“Thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me.” You say quietly. 

“Anytime. You’re welcome on our show anytime you want, _______.” Sarah interjects eagerly, then turns to face the cameras. “And we’ll be right back with you, after this break.” There’s a pause where they both stare at the camera, big smiles on their faces, then the cameraman nods and the room erupts. 

“Where did that speech come from?” Mettaton’s demanding, delighted. “Oh, your aunt, I’m so furious, _________, why didn’t you say?”

“This is going to be outrageous. This is going to mean a big time ratings boost.” John is saying. “Oh, okay, first thing you do, first thing, you put that up on Youtube, people are going to want to see that-”

“You did wonderfully. My god, you’re brave.” Sarah is telling you. “All alone, a ten year old, what an amazing story. Have you considered writing a -”

“Writing?! The TV special will make so much more money than any book? Do you have an agent? You need an agent.” John is demanding. 

“I’ll be guiding her through all that.” Mettaton interjects, as you’re about to open your mouth to say you’re not interested. “Sarah, John, thank you so much for coming. I told you she was going to be a star.” 

“But how did you do it? How did you manage to get by-” Sarah’s asking, but John’s looking at his watch. 

“Sarah, we really do need to run.” He mutters. “We need to be back in the studio in half an hour. Look. Here. My card.” He produces one, handing it to you and standing up. “Anytime, just call, and we’ll be ready to talk. Anytime.” He repeats, and just like that you’re all standing up, and John has shaken your hand and Sarah has hugged you and even one of the cameramen (well, a camerawoman) has come over to hug you, and as quickly as they arrived, they’re gone, out the front door and past the snowmen and the burnt trees. You slump slightly, turning to Mettaton. 

“I really did okay?” You check. He sighs, then hugs you so tightly you can barely breathe. 

“You’re a natural.” He whispers, stroking your back slowly. “You brave thing.” This isn’t on-camera Mettaton anymore, this is one of your rare glimpses into the real person at his core, and you don’t even mind being squeezed so tight. 

“Thank you for being there with me.” You mumble, hugging him back.

“Anytime, darling. Anytime.” 

\----------------------------------------------

The two of you barely take two steps inside before you’re absolutely tackled, Papyrus, Undyne, and Lesser Dog almost racing to get to you first. Sans and Alphys are hanging back a little bit, but also making their way over, the latter giving you a shy smile, the former looking at you like you just won every event in the Olympics all at once. It would be overwhelming, almost, this much affection all at once, but you really don’t care. 

“You kicked her ass! You kicked every ass!” Undyne’s crowing, throwing her arm around your shoulders as Lesser Dog shoves his head under your hand, his tail wagging wildly as he looks up at you adoringly. You scratch behind his ear absently, feeling a deep sort of relief, that it’s over, that everything’s out in the open, that you haven’t embarrassed your friends or yourself. 

“WE WATCHED FROM THE POOLHOUSE! YOU SAID SO MANY NICE THINGS ABOUT US!” Papyrus says, delighted. 

“‘Course she did, that’s my best friend.” Undyne’s saying proudly, grinning as she trades glances between Alphys and you.

“Y-you really did do great.” Alphys says, blushing adorably. 

“Man, thanks guys.” You say, feeling like you’re smiling a little stupidly. “Did you, um, I mean, did I seem like I was smart?”

“brilliant.” Sans says, that look still on his face, then glances at Mettaton. “hey, uh, bud. thanks for being there with her. you were great too.” He says, which makes you grin at him, then feel slightly suspicious when all the attention turns to Mettaton and he takes the opportunity to sidle over and lean up to kiss you, very thoroughly. Luckily, Mettaton enjoys the fawning and compliments significantly more than you do, and so you don’t feel too guilty about only paying attention to Sans at this moment, looping your arms around his neck and kissing him until Undyne finally notices and wolfwhistles. You pull back with a laugh and a grin, too relieved to feel embarrassed right now, and lean against him, listening to everyone chattering happily about this minor victory. “hey, uh, you still want to go out shopping somewhere?” Sans says, looking proud of you and a little smug and a thousand other things that you’re growing terribly fond of. 

“Oh!” Well, after that kiss, you’d kind of been thinking about different plans that might involve just you and him and maybe going back upstairs, but… well, that would be kind of rude to all your friends, huh? And it was the night before the, er, night before Christmas, and you needed gifts for everyone. “Sure. Let’s do it!” You decide. “Just let me look at my bank account and see what I’m working with.” You fish out your phone from your pocket - bless Mettaton for picking out something with pockets - and pull up your banking app, a little nervously. When you see the balance, your mouth pops open. 

“uh oh?” Sans says quietly. You immediately shake your head. 

“She’s been way, way too generous. Oh, god, a donor’s gonna audit or something and ask why the penguin girl got so much money…” You mutter, staring at the figure. It might not be a lot for some people - it’s absolutely nothing compared to what Paula stole from you. But compared to what you’re used to, even the meager amount you’ve saved, it’s incredible. It’s more than enough for a car, and for gifts, and for all the things you’ve been meaning to fix or upgrade around here. 

“Told you!” Undyne’s paying attention. “You sold yourself short for years! Barb loves you!” You shake your head slowly, then grin in spite of yourself. 

“Well. I guess I’m definitely going shopping.” You say, still in a mild state of disbelief. Sans smiles up at you. 

“great. you all coming?” He looks at the group of your friends. Everyone immediately nods. “okay, then let’s go.” A door in the world opens in your foyer suddenly. 

You’ve never seen anything like what’s on the other side.


	29. In Which The Author Has To Add Monster Kid Back To The Tags (Because She Felt Guilty Taking Him Out [So He's In This One])

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a really poop day, so here's a cute chapter with no cliffy hangz to make up for it. ILY kids.

“Ugh, _here?_ ” Undyne sighs. “Come on. Let’s go somewhere up topside, at least.” Sans scowls at her. 

“__________ just gave an interview about being buddies with monsters. so, uh, maybe some tact?” He demands.

“It might be for the best, love.” Mettaton sighs. “Besides, it’s only technically underground now, half the mountain’s open to the sky already.”

“What is that place?” You ask quietly, craning your head to get a better view. You get a glimpse of beautiful stained glass and mosaic tiles, the sound of raucous music and laughter, the smell of flowers, but Sans has clearly tucked the door somewhere out of the way, because even with the colors - god, how deep were those colors! - and the smell of good food, you can’t figure out what you’re looking at. 

“The old palace.” Undyne sighs. “I suppose a lot of people still like it.”

“I like it!” Alphys chimes in, a little shyly. “T-there’s music and games and little sh-shops and lots of food-”

“AND THE KING LIVES THERE, AND ANYONE WHO DOESN’T LIKE THE SURFACE ALL THE TIME! IT’S A SAFE PLACE FOR MONSTERS!” Papyrus enthuses. 

“and their friends.” Sans chimes in, giving Undyne a pointed look. She scowls for a second longer. 

“Hate the way you can still smell the limestone.” She grumbles, but steps through the portal, looking a bit uneasy and keeping her arms well at her sides as she does so. Thinking about what Sans had shown you, about what that fabric between spaces is filled with, you can’t blame her. Papyrus follows her with a wild laugh, and Alphys and Mettaton carefully pick their way through. Lesser Dog stays by your side, still trying to steal head scratches, but when you glance at Sans for reassurance and step forward, L.D. bolts through the door first. 

“just like the other night.” Sans encourages you. “just one step, don’t touch the edges.” You swallow, trying not to think about skulls or Gaster or any of that, and close your eyes, stepping through quickly, your boots clicking on polished tile. Undyne’s there waiting for you to step through, and she quickly pulls you out of the way so that Sans can follow. 

“Wow.” You whisper, glancing around, your eyes lighting up. 

Both Mettaton and Undyne are right. You’re most certainly underground, you can practically feel it in the air- you’re under Mt. Ebott! Oh, god, your parents would have given just about anything for this moment, they’d be so proud of you… you can’t remember the last time you’ve thought that, but it’s true. You wish that they could be there with you, that they could have seen _this._

You’re in an enormous room, all dappled stained glass and ornate, beautiful marblework. The colors are so rich it almost hurts to look at them, but it doesn’t seem like there’s half as many shades as you’re used to up above. And yet, through the windows, there’s rays of sunlight, penetrating an enormous cavern in crazy, haphazard beams. Some are emanating from massive cracks in the mountain (so big that you can even see the distant ocean through them), some are just tiny holes that narrow beams of light, no wider than a flashlight, shine through. You wonder how many monsters had been itching to take a chunk of the mountain that had held them in for so long down when they decided to leave. It surely had to be a lot, to leave the cavern this palace was in so riddled with holes like swiss cheese.

“I thought humans weren’t allowed down here without diplomatic clearance?” You say, glancing around. “I thought that the monster King was worried-”

“hey, you’re with us. you’ve got clearance.” Sans laughs, fitting his hand in yours. You hadn’t even noticed him stepping through, or the door closing, too busy looking and listening and smelling…

The room is something else entirely, after all. Sans had made the door from your house to this room so that your group all stepped out in an out of the way corner, behind what looks like several stalls, but when he tugs you forward, excitement in his eyes, you take it all in at once. It’s just so beautiful! There’s stalls of all sizes and descriptions, vendors of every kind of monster you’ve ever seen, and dozens you haven’t, all selling clothes, drinks, toys, snacks, decorations, jewelry. Some of the stalls look temporary, like they’ve been slapped up in a rush for Christmas, but others have clearly been here as long as the underground’s been opened when the barrier fell. There’s even, you notice, a carefully constructed wooden bar in a corner of the room; a Grillby’s franchise, maybe, with a pretty green fire elemental behind the bar. 

And the whole great hall is crammed with monsters (and the very occasional human), all laughing and shopping and socializing and eating, lit by torches and those odd beams of sunlight and the ambient glow of the cave walls that must be magic...

“It’s so pretty.” You whisper. Sans nods. 

“it’s a lot better than it used to be.” He says, glancing around slowly as if he’s trying to see it with fresh eyes. 

“I never really thought I’d ever see the underground, not after mom and dad…” You murmur, leaning a little closer to him to talk over the noise and the music.

“this really wasn’t a happy place.” He says, looking around. “back then, it was a bad bad place. sometimes, anyway. you know what our king did. it was a place that… kids died in.” He says, sounding a little strained, but then quickly adds, “i wouldn’t come back here, ever, if i couldn’t see the sky out those windows.” He glances quickly over your shoulder, just to make sure it's still there. You hesitate, then bite your lip. 

“You hate it down here, don’t you.” You say quietly. “Sans, let’s go. I know you’re trying to watch out for me, but…”

“nah. it’s fine.” He says quickly. “i’m near here every day for work, anyway. told you, i work for asgore.” 

“You also told me you never wanted to go back underground.” You say quietly. 

“‘s not underground if you can see the sky.” He says firmly. “that’s what i keep telling myself anyway. besides, you like it. you said it’s pretty.” 

“It’s… I mean, it’s so beautiful.” You admit. “I can’t believe I’m here. But-”

“then it’s settled. look, everyone else is already having a good time.” He says, nodding over your shoulder again. You turn your head to see Papyrus talking animatedly to a beautiful rabbit monster, and Undyne hoisting a small, armless monster up on her shoulders with a grin. Alphys has already dived into a stall that has a sign above it reading “C0MiXS,” manned by a monster that looks half-cat, half-dog, and one hundred percent vacant. Mettaton is predictably swarmed by adoring fans of all descriptions, of course, and out of the corner of your eye, you can see Lesser Dog running up to a similar looking, but much, much bigger dog. 

“Fine.” You say with a small smile. “But you’ll tell me, okay? As soon as you want to go?” 

“promise.” He says, and hand in hand, you begin to pick through the crowd, as you rack your brains to think of what might possibly be good enough for all your new friends. 

\-----------------------------

A few hours later, and you’re totally exhausted. Apparently Christmas shopping in the underground is much the same as Christmas shopping on the surface. It’s fun! But… it’s tiring. Still, you and Sans have had a blast picking out different things for everyone, and the monsters you meet are more than willing to take your human money off your hands. At first, you think that your method of payment is the reason everyone’s so excited to talk with you, but the longer you spend among the throng of monsters, the more often you can swear you hear your name whispered, until you realize it’s not just a coincidence. 

“Sans? Do... uh, am I crazy or do a lot of these people know who I am?” You ask, leaning your elbow on the ledge of a snack stand and balancing your shopping bags on your knee while you get a better grip. Sans is insisting on buying you a nice cream cone when you make the mistake of telling him you’ve never had one. He glances over at you with a wry expression. 

“you, uh, _did_ make a big splash on the news this morning.” He points out. “and mettaton was on there too, so half the monsters in here must have seen it.”

“Oh. Geez.” You mutter, suddenly embarrassed. “I didn’t really think about that. Oh, man, people must be thinking...” You trail off, shaking your head.He raises an eyebrow ridge, distractedly passing a few gold to the nice cream guy. 

“yeah, how embarrassing.” He drawls. “you went on tv and said really nice things about monsters to the entire world. these people must think you’re terrible.” He says sarcastically, giving you an infuriating smirk and then passing you the nice cream. You shake your head. 

“I’m just not used to being, you know, paid so much attention to.” You say, holding the cone in your free hand. His expression softens. 

“they just like you, babe. but if it’s too much, we’ll go.” He says, more gently. You shake your head. 

“No, no. It’s good. It’s fine. It’s just… surprising.” You say with a small smile, then remember your nice cream and cautiously take a lick. “Oh my god.” You sigh after a moment, after a cool, delicious flavor washes over your tastebuds. Immediately, you take another taste. Sans grins at you. 

“good?” He says, and you nod quickly. 

“How is magic food so good!? It tastes like all my favorite desserts at once!” You laugh, too delighted by this new discovery to feel awkward about the sensation of so many eyes on you. “Do you want some?” Sans shakes his head. 

“nah. more fun watching you.” He says with a chuckle. Of course not. He doesn’t eat if he can help it. You sigh, and, remembering his move this morning, do your best pout. 

“Baby.” You say plaintively. His eyes are fixed on you, and almost immediately he gives in, taking the nice cream and tasting it quickly; oh, that’s… interesting, watching an invisible tongue lick an ice cream cone. You hadn’t actually seen his tongue before, it tended to be engaged somewhere in your mouth, but you supposed it made sense that it was invisible, after all, he kissed you with lips you couldn’t see. Was… was _everything_ invisible? Oh, god, you’re suddenly feeling quite warm.

“it’s pretty good.” He agrees, passing the cone back to you, and for a moment, you’re distracted enough to realize that it takes basically one pout from you and he’ll do what you’re asking. That is dangerous information to have. Then again… well, one pout from him this morning, and you’d been seriously close to forgetting about “wardrobe” or anything else that involved getting out of bed… but this chain of thought is not helping you in your effort to not turn red. 

“Why don’t you like to eat?” You ask quickly, and he makes a face. 

“uh, i think that’s something that my dad didn’t exactly have fine tuned, back when he was making a son. i don’t think whatever he made me out of was supposed to eat much of anything.” He says. “i mean, i can do it, just takes concentration and i’m pretty lazy.” You arch an eyebrow. Well, he is at that, even if he’s had a busy few days. “drinking’s way easier. he got that down.” He adds with a laugh. “think he had eating figured out a little too well by the time he gave me paps, anyway, that kid ate me out of house and home and all i knew how to make was pasta, in the beginning.”

“Oh. Sans, I’m sorry, I don’t mean to push you-” You say quickly, filled with sudden affection for the skeleton who thinks he isn’t quite built right, and the glowing way he talks about his brother even though you know some people would be nothing but jealous.

“nah. you’re right. i do need to eat food every once in awhile. otherwise i’d starve to the bone.” He says, smirking at you expectantly. You give a single, pointed “ha” to tell him that the joke isn’t very funny, which makes him look happier than ever. Oh, you like seeing him so happy. It seems he’s even forgotten his discomfort being underground, when he’s looking up at you like that. “uh. your nice cream is melting.” He says, distracting you from your moment of content, that you could make him look like that. 

“Oh!” It’s dripped onto your hand without you noticing. You glance around for napkins, see none, then shrug mentally and lick it off your hand, hoping nobody will notice, then do your best to eat the part that’s melting, licking the melted nice cream off the cone.

“uh. heh.” You glance back at Sans, and just barely restrain yourself from giving him your own smug smile, seeing how obviously flustered he is.

“Yes?” You ask sweetly. Oh, this is much more fun than when he’s teasing you.

“oh, uh… asgore! hi!” Sans sounds absolutely thrilled, suddenly looking behind you, and you turn around quickly to see an absolutely enormous monster, easily head and shoulders taller even than Papyrus, making his way towards you. He’s wearing, incongruently, khakis and a hawaiian shirt. 

“Sans! I didn’t expect to see you down here!” The monster says jovially. The king, you think to yourself, this is the king of all monsters, or is it King, with a capital K, you’re not sure, but you’re sure of one thing, you never expected to be meeting him with what you’re suddenly sure is nice cream on your chin. “Oh, and this must be the human I’ve heard so much about! Welcome to the palace, _________.” 

The king of the monsters knows your name without being introduced. 

That thought almost grinds your brain to a halt, but then suddenly you remember Toriel, and Frisk, and that Papyrus works in Asgore’s gardens, and suddenly you feel more at ease. Maybe it’s natural that he knows about you, right, and it’s not like you haven’t met royalty before, a queen had brought dinner to your house, so…

“T-thank you so much, your majesty.” You stammer. “It’s really wonderful.”

“Well, we’re certainly glad to have you here!” Asgore says, with a big, booming laugh. “And it’s just Asgore, please.” Sans draws a little closer to you, and you wonder if it would be terrible manners to take another lick of your nice cream, or if you should just let it drip all over your hand - thankfully Sans has spotted your dilemma, and he deftly steals the treat, eating it just a little insolently as he grins up at Asgore.

“we wanted to go christmas shopping. figured it was probably better down here, after the broadcast.” Sans says. Asgore nods mournfully. 

“Perhaps that is for the best.” He murmurs, shaking his massive head. “Child, please do tell me if you encounter any further problems? If I had known the sort of thing you were facing-”

“told you, boss. we got it covered.” Sans says abruptly, and for a second, there’s clear resentment in the air between them, or at least coming from Sans. Asgore still looks awfully depressed. 

“I’m certain you do, Sans.” He sighs. “All the same. If there are any further problems, please do let me know. I feel that I owe you a debt, _________.” You blink up at the massive monster, confused. “You’re working so tirelessly against discrimination on the surface, and it’s brought you nothing but grief.” You have to laugh at that. 

“It’s not work, your majesty.” You say quickly. You can’t bring yourself to call him Asgore. He just looks like a majesty! “They’re my best friends! I got them in the bargain, so I’m coming out way ahead.” 

“thanks, babe.” Sans says with a chuckle, and Asgore nods approvingly - of what you’ve just said, or of you and Sans? You’re smiling up at the king, when Undyne and Papyrus come tearing around the corner of the stall. Undyne still has the monster kid perched on her shoulders, and he looks wild with glee. 

“Jeez, there you are, loser, I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” Undyne laughs. “Oh, hey Asgore!” Asgore nods at her politely. 

“Oh, I’ve just been shopping - hey, no peeking!” You scold Papyrus, who’s craning your head to try and see what’s in the big paper bags. 

“MORE LIKE OFF KISSING MY BROTHER!” Papyrus replies petulantly. The monster on Undyne’s shoulders starts cracking up, looking worshipfully at Papyrus.

“What, no I wasn’t-” There it goes. The king is looking at you, and you are just praying for the floor to drop out from under you so that you don’t need to be in that fatherly, mildly amused stare. 

“Ha, sure, like we’re gonna believe that.” Undyne snorts, lazily shifting the kid off her shoulders and setting him on the ground. “Go find your mom, squirt.” She tells him in an aside, and he grins at her before taking off through the crowd. 

“I really wasn’t, look, look at it, look at all the shopping!” You say desperately, holding up your bags. “Papyrus, no peeking!” Oh, stupid Sans is enjoying this way too much, which you probably deserve, but all the same-

“what’s the big deal, anyway?” He asks, taking another lick of nice cream. 

“THE SUN’S ABOUT TO SET AND THEY’RE GOING TO TURN ON THE CHRISTMAS TREE LIGHTS!” Papyrus enthuses. “ARE YOU LAZY BONES COMING TO SEE OR NOT?” 

“heh. sure.” Sans laughs. “trade you, babe.” He offers you the nice cream in exchange for your shopping bags, and you do so gratefully, looking for anything that means you don’t need to meet the gaze of the king. 

“I’ll leave you to it.” Asgore chuckles. “Sans, I’ll see you back in the library in the New Year. Papyrus, we have gardening to attend to as well, when you’re done with vacation.” He smiles at the skeletons and Undyne, then at you. “_________, you’re welcome to come visit any time.” He tells you.

“Kay! Later, majesty!” Undyne calls, and immediately links arms with you, marching you through the thick crowd, through the gallery hall and into another, then another, still more shops, more monsters, until finally you emerge in a huge space, the roof entirely open to the sky, with the biggest Christmas tree you’ve ever seen dominating the center of the room. The room is packed, but the crowd parts for you and Undyne like a school of minnows does for a shark. Sans and Papyrus are a little behind you, but they catch up as Undyne guides you over to Alphys, L.D. and Mettaton, who are all the way up by the foot of the tree. 

“Woah.” You mutter, and quickly take the last few bites of your nice cream, munching the cone. 

“We never had them this big in the underground before.” Mettaton says, staring up at the tree. 

“dunno why. there were pine trees this big in snowdin.” Sans says quietly, but even he seems a little awed. 

“W-we didn’t have um…” Alphys starts.

“That much to celebrate.” Undyne concludes dryly. “But this year…”

“We were given freedom.” Mettaton murmurs. 

“A-and the beach!” Alphys chimes in. 

“AND DRIVING DOWN THE HIGHWAY!” Papyrus says, grinning wildly. Lesser Dog whines, and Undyne whirls to glare at him. 

“No, L.D.! NOT lizards, we don’t eat those!” She says firmly, then grins. “Sushi, though.”

“I got you guys.” You hear yourself say softly. Mettaton is the first to let out an “awwwwww,” as perfectly cued as if it were a sitcom sound effect. Undyne almost immediately chimes in, but she’s grinning. You roll your eyes at them, smiling widely yourself. 

“and the sun. we got the sun.” Sans says, and you’re just turning to look at him when the light in the cave dims for an instant- the sun must have just slipped over the horizon outside, but a thousand points of white light flicker on all over the huge tree; they’re not electric, so they must be magic. They look like the light in Sans’ eyes. The whole cavernous room starts cheering wildly, and some monsters begin singing a song - it’s a carol you’ve never heard before. It’s beautiful, even if you can’t make out any of the words in the eruption of excitement. 

You lean just a little against Sans, feeling wonderfully content in this moment, and pretend not to notice that he’s not even looking at the tree, even though everyone else is. He’s looking right at you.


	30. In Which You Finally Fire Up That Ol' VHS Player of Yours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god, I can't believe how hilariously cruelly the timing has worked out on this. I feel like you guys are going to say I planned it, but I literally don't plan anything, so nope, this is just a wonderful coincidence. 
> 
> What I'm saying is, no updates on 1/8 and 1/9, because TST is getting visited by her brother and sister-in-law, and she needs to show them around the Big Apple (which is what all native New Yorkers always call it, pro tip). 
> 
> Feel free to scream at me in the comments or on my [tumblr.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> ahahaha I'm actually cackling right now, good lord strike this sinner down.

After the singing and excitement following the tree’s illumination begins to wind down, Sans looks over at the group of you. Undyne and Alphys are holding hands, gazing up at the lights and ornaments on the branches still, but Lesser Dog is yawning, sitting patiently by Mettaton’s side, and Papyrus is clearing his throat rather pointedly. Sans smiles at him. 

“yeah, bro?”

“IT’S ALMOST DINNER TIME.” Papyrus says. “HINT.” Undyne groans. 

“Papyrus, I keep telling you, that’s not how hinting works.” 

“IF I DON’T SAY HINT HOW WILL ANYONE KNOW THAT I’M HINTING?” Papyrus demands. You grin to yourself, liking his logic, then nod at your towering housemate. 

“I suppose it probably is time to head back home, if everyone’s done. And we’ve got like three dinners worth of leftovers to eat, there’s more than enough for everyone.”

“Any snail pie left?” Undyne says hopefully. 

“Uh, yeah. Tons.” You say, arching an eyebrow. There hadn’t exactly been a high demand for it, after all. 

“Sick.” Undyne gives you her pointiest grin, and then quickly glances down at Alphys when the smaller monster tugs on her hand. 

“A-are you sure we’re not, um… imposing?” She stammers, looking up at you, her cheeks red. “It’s j-just that we’ve all been having s-such a g-great time… ummm, when you’re n-not being attacked?” She practically whispers, barely audible over the noise of the crowd of monsters. You smile at her, feeling a little guilty that you’ve clearly not made your opinion on her clear.

“Alphys, you and Undyne and Mettaton are all always welcome. Like, seriously. I know you three have your own homes and stuff, but I love having you all around. You can stay at our place as often as you want, right boys?” You say, grinning at the skeletons and L.D., and feeling just a little manipulative. The truth is, you just _love_ having everyone around, having this new adopted family that just feels so right, even though some of them have the tendency to barge in your room or commandeer the TV for anime or any of the other little habits that might be annoying if you didn’t like them so much! You don’t want them to leave, really, you don’t want this to be over… well, Sans and Papyrus and L.D. would be sticking around with you, but…

“‘course.” Sans chuckles, seeing the look on your face. “c’mon, alph, you don’t need to worry, look at her, she loves having you guys around. uh, me too.”

“I DO LIKE IT WHEN WE’RE ALL TOGETHER.” Papyrus agrees, and Alphys smiles bashfully at all of you. 

“k. all settled. ready to go?” Sans drawls. 

“Hey guys. Where are we going?” That voice is new. You turn around quickly to see the new speaker, and are faced with a short, almost sombrero shaped monster, who looks up at you with black, watery eyes, a scowl on its face. Behind you, you hear a soft groan coming from Mettaton, and a sigh of dismay from Alphys. 

“Oh. Hey, Jerry.” Undyne sighs, very reluctantly. 

“Who’s this?” Jerry narrows his eyes accusatorially at you. Ugh, he’s got what looks like that powdered dust from cheese snacks all over his face and fingers. “Looks dumb.” He adds, sucking on one finger slowly. Oh, gross. And rude! 

“ugh.” It’s funny, really, Sans can stare eldritch abominations full on in the face, no problem, but even he clearly doesn’t like looking at Jerry. “jerry, bud. we’re about to split, but we all need to go check on a thing. you mind hanging tight here?” He says, clearly trying to keep the irritation out of his voice. 

“I suppppoossse.” Jerry sighs, melancholic, and sits right down on the cavern floor under the Christmas tree. A split wordless second of communication passes between your friends, and then everyone, even Papyrus (who tends to miss subtle social cues) follows Sans quickly out of sight, to a less populated hallway. He opens a door back to the foyer of your home wordlessly, and this time, there’s absolutely no hesitation from your group. 

You and the other monsters ditch Jerry. 

\-----------------------------------------

At this point, you’re ready for the next awful thing to happen (ha, as if anything could be worse than meeting Jerry) the second the portal closes behind you. The house is quiet except for your friends and Ghost, who is meowing from somewhere, probably the kitchen. Undyne, Alphys and Mettaton are sharing Jerry war stories, griping about how much they hate that guy, and Papyrus is trying to talk over them about dinner, totally distracted. Lesser Dog seems to agree with Papyrus, sitting next to the tall skeleton, his tail waving in a blur of energy. 

“hey.” You jump slightly, then grimace. Okay, so you’re a little on edge. “you wanna check and make sure everything’s okay?” Sans asks softly. You bite your lip, then nod. 

“Feeling a little paranoid.” You admit. Undyne overhears this and sighs. 

“You need another set of eyes?” She offers. 

“nah. we’ll be fast. maybe you and paps can get dinner started, though.” Sans says. Papyrus’ eyes go wide; he loves cooking with Undyne. Undyne grins at him. 

“Sure thing, punk. Let’s get started. C’mon, sweetie, help me set up drinks.” She urges Alphys, then glances back at you. “You need any help, you know where to find me.” Sans nods, and waits by the door while you find your winter coat in the hall closet.

Stepping outside, it’s a beautiful, cool, starry night. There must have been another snow shower when you were inside shopping, since there’s a few centimeters of snow on the snowdog and snow skeleton outside that weren’t there yesterday, giving them an oddly misshapen look. It would be nice, being outside, if it weren’t for the fact that you were there looking for the next awful thing. 

“they’re still camped out there.” Sans sighs, nodding at the distant fence. Sure enough, there’s still half a dozen media vans parked on the street. You groan. 

“I don’t own that land. Technically, they’ve got a right to be there.” You say quietly. It doesn’t look like they’ve noticed you’re outside, and you want to take advantage of that. 

“mm. you know, the ones from last night aren’t there. maybe if i send these guys on a field trip too…” Sans says, voice dripping with black humor. 

“Too! Soon! Bonehead.” You grumble. “You promised. No touching them.” He sighs and nods. 

“yeah, yeah. be nice to the vultures.” He agrees, then, after a second’s thought, adds; “they’re probably doing us a favor, anyway.” 

“How’s that?” You ask, surprised to hear any kind words about the photographers escape his mouth. 

“whatever group’s been coming by to vandalize your house isn’t gonna risk it with six news vans out front.” He says with a shrug. You blink, processing this. He’s right.

“Huh... Maybe I should continue to be scandalous.” You say, looking out at the dark silhouettes of the vans. Sans smirks.

“i like the sound of that.” He says, giving you a very toothy smile.

“Oh, I bet you do.” You laugh, raising an eyebrow, then sigh, as, across the front yard, a flashbulb goes off from inside a van. You’ve been spotted. “C’mon, let’s walk around back and just make sure everything’s okay back there before we go in.”

“sounds way less fun than, uh, being scandalous.” Sans says, but then he grins at you and takes your hand, and the two of you crunch through the snow and away from the flash of the cameras. You’re wracking your brain for a witty retort, but none are forthcoming; probably, you think, because you agree with him.

\---------------------------------

Sans is right. Clearly, the photographers are enough to keep the vandals away for now: even the snow is undisturbed. You still shudder when you pass the spot where he’d opened the void yesterday, but other than that, there’s nothing remarkable. Undyne glances up quickly when you slide the door that separates the backyard from the kitchen open, and relaxes when she sees it’s just you. 

“Anything?” She checks. 

“nope.” Sans says softly, stomping the snow off his sneakers and holding his hand out for your coat without being asked. Aw, your boyfriend was sweet. Undyne smiles when you pass it over and give him a kiss on the cheek for his thoughtfulness, then she looks seriously at you as Sans strolls off to hang it up. 

“You okay? I know it’s stressful, waiting for the other shoe to drop.” 

“I’ve got you guys. I’ve never felt safer.” You admit with a small smile. Undyne grins at you, and then steps back as Papyrus comes rushing in, grabbing two big casserole containers out of the oven and carrying them into the dining room without a word, a manic grin on his face. You’d need to remember to read him a bedtime story tonight, you think to yourself, his routine is probably all disrupted…

Well, this plan is quashed when Papyrus announces over dinner that he intends to start off his real Christmas vacation by marathoning every Mettaton Christmas special that night. Undyne and Alphys think this is a wonderful idea; Mettaton thinks it’s the best thing he’s ever heard. And Sans, well,

“we’ll probably watch one or two before bed.” He says lazily, and it takes all your willpower to not give him a look. It certainly sounds like he’s got plans for you tonight, you think, staring down at the half eaten lasagna on your plate and trying not to blush or smile or anything like that. He’s being awfully presumptuous, you tell yourself firmly, just announcing when you’ll go to bed, much less that the two of you will be going to bed together…

Oh, goddamnit, __________, stop smiling. 

He notices, of course, even if he doesn’t say anything, because he’s got that smug look in his eyes for the rest of dinner and all the way into the other room. You can practically feel his eyes on your butt as you root around the entertainment center, trying to reconnect the VHS player so Papyrus can play his taped collection of Mettaton specials (“sadly, darling, I’m at an impasse regarding pricing with all the major streaming services,” the robot pouts - his eyes are on the screen, waiting for his face to appear). When you finally get it working, everyone lets out a cheer in varying degrees of enthusiasm, and you settle in next to Sans with a laugh, watching the first special begin playing. 

Well… Mettaton has certainly come a long way, you think tactfully, half an hour later. That is to say, the special is… well, it’s watchable, barely. To see the looks on everyone’s faces but Sans - even Lesser Dog’s, since he’s joined you halfway through the film - they’ve just watched a worldshaking masterpiece. Sans and you exchange a look. 

“One more?” You ask quietly, and he smirks at you before nodding. This next one, which seems to be about how Mettaton saved Christmas through the power of glam rock, at least has songs, which makes up for the poor production values. Furthermore, halfway through the videotape, Ghost comes wandering in, and without even blinking, curls up with L.D. on the floor, purring loudly. This truly is a Christmas miracle, you think wryly, snuggling up against Sans’ shoulder and watching the musical numbers with half lidded eyes.

Finally, it’s over, and Sans gives a big, fake yawn. 

“time for us to hit the hay.” He says, standing up, then offering you a hand. 

“SO EARLY! YOU’RE SUCH A BABY BONES, SANS!” Papyrus laughs. “I CAN STAY UP MUCH LATER THAN YOU.”

“i know, bud. you’re way cooler than me.” Sans says with a shrug. Mettaton, Undyne and Alphys don’t say anything, but they all have different variations of the same expression on their faces; it definitely belongs in the _knowing amusement_ family. You’re blushing down to your toes, but you manage a cheerful,

“Night everyone!” and wave at them before heading upstairs with Sans. When you’re out of earshot, you give him a look. “You know, you could have been a little more subtle.”

“why would i be subtle? we’re just going to bed.” Sans says, face perfectly composed, but you can tell when he thinks he’s getting away with something. Oh, he can just keep pushing his luck, you think irritably, but still walk into your bedroom with him. It isn’t until the door closes that you start to feel, well, awkward. Neither of you has bothered to turn on the light: the moon outside is so bright that your room is illuminated in cool shades of blue, and the only other pinpricks of light in the room come from his eyes. 

“I, uh…” You mutter, thinking about how long it’s been since you’ve last been in a position anywhere close to this. “I’m pretty sure… I mean, uh, it’s been a long time…”

“s’okay.” The playful look is off his face now, replaced with something much more affectionate. “me, uh, too. no pressure. just wanted a little time with you on your own.” He’s clearly telling the truth, which makes that anxiety melt a little. You take a step closer to him (it wasn’t like you were far away), and he leans up to kiss you. 

He’s an excellent kisser. He’s an excellent everything. He knows exactly how to make you swoon, and you can’t tell if this is because he’s experienced - blerg, whenever you think of that, you get the mental image of him and Toriel and you have to work hard at pushing it away - or if he’s just great at reading you. Whichever it is, you barely notice when the two of you take the steps from the doorway, and end up sitting next to each other on the bed, lips still locked. 

Why does your overactive brain have to ruin everything? You find yourself parting from him, panting slightly, trying not to feel awkward that his hand has slipped under your shirt and his bony fingers are exploring your lower spine even as you look at him. You have a very important question, that you can’t be distracted from. “Sans. Lips?” You ask quietly. He looks nonplussed, but when no answer is forthcoming, you add, “You’re a skeleton. How? Lips, tongue, uh…”

“oh! heh.” He laughs. “uh, magic. hey, hey, hang on!” He sees you threaten to scowl. “I mean, okay, skeleton monster basics… my bones are physical. my body is magic. takes a lot of work to have a whole body all the time, though, so… i usually only, uh, manifest the parts i’m thinking about, when i need them.” He says, still looking at your lips like he wants to stop talking. 

“And they’re invisible because…” You try.

“it’s work to make them visible?” Sans laughs, a little out of breath. “and i’d look weird with lips.”

“Not with a tongue, though.” You mutter, then feel your face flame red as he grins. He gets a look of concentration, then opens his mouth, revealing sharp canines and a very inhuman, slightly glowing blue tongue. 

“better?” He murmurs, all wicked amusement. You nod quickly, and lean back to kiss him once more, torn between intense interest and frustration at how lazy your boyfriend can apparently be. Suddenly, another thought occurs to you, and you pull back again. 

“Wait a second.” You ask the put-out looking skeleton. “You said you only manifest things when you need them. So, this morning…”

Sans buries his face in his hands, then peeks at you between two fingers. 

“heh. god. okay. busted. i, uh… had a good dream.” He stammers. His blush is brighter than the glow from the tongue in his mouth, or the moonlight. “about you, i mean. i don’t know if that make it any better. um. but yeah.” He slowly raises his head, looking nervously at you.

It’s cruel, you think, holding him over the coals like this, just because you think it’s fun to see him as flustered as he makes you. Well, shit, it is fun. But it’s probably not moral. You wait another second or two, then grin, leaning forward to plant a soft kiss on his lips. 

“Good. Wouldn’t want you dreaming about anyone else.” You murmur, letting your hand rest on his femur. He makes a soft, pleased noise, and kisses you again, much more roughly, and you’re just putty in his hands. His hands, incidentally, seem pretty focused on taking your shirt off, and that is just fine by you, all of a sudden. After all, you think, pulling away from him so he can get it over your head, turnabout is fair play. His eyes are fixed on you, drinking you in, and you’re so glad that you’re not wearing one of your weird bras today, because he looks like he’s about to lose his mind, he likes what he’s seeing so much. It’s a hell of a confidence boost, you think, your fingers slowly trailing higher, over the fabric of his shorts...

He’d asked you that morning, if you were curious about what sort of bone he was packing.

You were suddenly, you think, leaning your head back so he can scrape his teeth carefully against your neck…

Oh, you were very curious.


	31. In Which You Realize You've Had Bacon Three Mornings in a Row and that it's Kinda Bad For You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> By publishing this, I am officially consigning myself to hell.   
> By reading this, you're all definitely going too. 
> 
> FANART FIESTA:
> 
> I know you want to read the chapter but stop what you're doing and [look at this](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/136898073521/mainlyterrestrial-did-a-thiiiing-i-dont-know). Then come back and sin.

It wasn’t fair that Sans didn’t have a heart. Here you were, your pulse hammering so loudly in your ears that you could barely hear anything else, and he was probably just playing it cool. Couldn’t almost have a heart attack without a heart, right, that’s probably why you were practically shaking with excitement and he just seemed to know what he was doing. He clearly had a natural advantage, the jerk. Stupid mean skeleton, stupid…

“heh. fuck. s-sorry.” He stammers in your ear, and after a second, you realize that he’s stuck, unable to figure how your bra unclasps. You can’t help it. You let out a slightly hysterical laugh, your hand stalling on its glacial journey up his leg. He gives you a hangdog, guilty (maybe a little hurt?) smile, and you shake your head. 

“Sorry, sorry!” You say quickly. “Just… hahaa, god, you can figure out _everything!_ You cut a door in space today just so we could go shopping!” He looks at you, confused. “It’s… it’s a hook and eye, bonehead. Push, don’t pull.” You murmur, shaking your head again. He squints at you, clearly still confused, then suddenly lets out a laugh. 

“ _oh!_ ” He says, grinning widely, and a split second later, your bra is off, and you’re no longer laughing. Right, right, that was the logical conclusion to his attempt, right? And he’s just studying you like he can’t bear to tear his eyes away from your breasts. Which is flattering, but… he’s a skeleton, right? Maybe he just thinks it’s weird. Maybe he’d prefer a ribcage. Maybe he’s just taking a scientific interest. 

“Uh. Is this… okay?” You hear yourself wonder. His eyes finally dart back up to meet yours, a huge, hungry smile on his face. 

“hell yes.” He whispers, and leans forward to kiss you again, a hand instantly moving to explore what he’d uncovered. Oh, fuck, okay. When he was doing that, you could only focus on how good it felt, so much that the narration that had been running in your head, telling you all the things that were wrong with you, that he was going to find fault with, that were embarrassing… that constant monologue just stopped. You let him slowly ease you onto your back, your head still happily swimming. His kisses were moving down your neck now - oh, man, his teeth were sharp, he was gentle, but they were still sharp, and you had a half second where you thought to yourself that if you were covered in bite marks tomorrow, you were going to smack him, but then he found the muscle connecting your neck to your shoulder, kissing it ravenously, and it just didn’t matter anymore. You could be one big bruise for all you cared, you decide, if he kept this up.

Or, oh god, if he moved lower still. 

His tongue moves over your nipple and you let out a soft, pleased noise, stroking his spine through his shirt. You can practically feel his grin - can you literally feel it? - at this reaction, and he immediately repeats the experiment on your other breast. Right, right, a good scientist always checks his hypothesis. This time you’re anticipating it, but you still can’t help yourself, you practically whimper, clutching at him tightly, and he groans quietly in response, pressing his hipbones to yours. When had he gotten so... on top of you? Oh, it didn’t matter, all that mattered now is that his hand was resting on the waistband of your pants. Hey, hadn’t you been planning on indulging your curiosity, hadn’t that been your plan this whole time, to get him undressed? He was certainly beating you to that particular goal. Why was he hesitating, though? He looks up at you.

“still okay if we keep going?” He asks quietly, but quite seriously. You blink, then nod. “yes?” He prompts deliberately.

“Yes!” You agree, a little shakily, and he grins at you again, like you’re giving him the world.

“cool. uh. my info on how to do this is pretty… theoretical? so you’ll tell me if i mess up?” He murmurs, unbuttoning your pants almost casually as he talks and sliding them down around your hips. You nod quickly, then let out a, “Definitely,” since you know he’ll just make you say it out loud again and you don’t feel like waiting that long; you’re already kicking your legs out of your pants, and, in a quick play for power, while he’s a little distracted by the sight of you practically naked, you find the hem of his shirt and raise it carefully, making sure that it doesn’t get snagged on his ribcage; but, hell, he always seems to fill his clothes out, doesn’t he, how the hell does that work…

That train of thought is abruptly derailed as he begins to rub you through your panties, and all you can do is gasp, and very quickly yank his shirt over his head. He bursts out laughing when it gets stuck on his skull, and he has to stop for a second to shrug the shirt off before grinning at you. The look on his face is half affection, half heated desire. It was not an expression you could have figured, even a few weeks ago, that you would ever see on a skeleton’s face. Now, well, you just giggle at his amusement, then lean up and kiss him, melting halfway through the kiss when he resumes teasing you. When he pulls away, he has serious intent on his face; the amusement is gone.

“can i use my mouth?”

“I don’t know, can you?” You surprise yourself by saying, giving him a daring smile. This so isn’t like you, you feel like you should be an anxious mess, but you’re just so _comfortable_ with him! And, well, maybe this doesn’t have to be nerve wracking, maybe you don’t need to overanalyze every second of it, maybe this can just be right! 

He narrows his eyes suspiciously at you, his hand hovering over the waistband of your panties. You smirk and nod. 

“Yes, please.” You say, very clearly, and he gives you that marvelling, starving smile again before pulling your underwear away. After that, you have to stop thinking for a while. 

It is absolutely, one thousand percent unfair, the realization bubbles up, that this tongue has been trapped in the underground for as long as it has. 

Okay, that’s not exactly fair, you’re also terribly fond of the skeleton that it’s attached to. If it is, technically, attached to him. The fact remains that, at this, he’s a goddamn virtuoso. To the point that you can’t say anything, can barely think, can only gasp softly, trying to remember that there are other people in this house, that you can’t scream. He just knows you. He knows your anatomy, apparently, better than anyone could, better than even you could possibly imagine. He knows just where you like to be touched, and even places that have never seemed that interesting feel astonishing when that tongue, practically crackling with magic, moves over them. Ha, you’d thought you’d liked that dizzying rush from his magic before! Now, like this, you can’t believe anything could feel so good - and it’s just his tongue, you think, oh god, can you even handle more than this?

Your muscles are tensing before too long, and you’re fighting it, trying to hold off what you know is inevitable, because you want this to last, you feel almost greedy but you don’t have it in you to care, you want to feel like this for the rest of your life. He’s of another mind, clearly, because he just keeps driving you on, his tongue relentless, and that feeling of magic is just pooling in your belly, a barrier waiting to crumble…

One more stroke of his tongue, and it’s over. 

“SANS!”

Too loud, too loud, ________, but you don’t care right now, you can’t, your body is shaking and for a second you feel empty, you want more, you want so much more, but then the next wave of pleasure hits, then the next, and the next, and you’re panting, replete and exhausted and sprawled out on the bed. 

Moving a single muscle would be way, way, too much. Even breathing seems like a challenge. But you’re looking at him from the corner of your eyes as he slowly pulls his head away from you, and he looks like… you’ve seen that expression before, on the face of athletes after they get a trophy, on lotto winners on TV, on elected officials who are just a little too obviously pleased to have beaten their opponents. That smug little… oh, god, you can’t even complain, you don’t have room in your head right now, you just have to reach up and wrap your arms around him, pulling him back to your side so you can kiss him. 

He kisses you for a long, long time, sprawled out on his side next to you, not demanding too much. You slowly manage to catch your breath, feeling his fingers slip through your hair like you’ve already grown accustomed to. When he parts from you again, he’s managed to tame the smugness some, and he’s looking at you all sweet and soft. 

“i was okay?” He asks quietly, and you have to giggle. 

“Uh, yeah. Holy…. holy shit, Sans.” You murmur, kissing the corner of his mouth. “That’s a really hard act to follow.” He grins to himself, then seems to register your meaning when your hand drifts to his waistband.

“oh… heh.” That smug look is suddenly magnified a thousand times. Oh, hell, he deserves it. Besides, he’s not even making any jokes about the fact that you’d said ‘really hard,’ and surely he deserves some kind of acknowledgement for that. Slipping your finger between his hips and his gym shorts, you grin and murmur,

“So, I finally get to see all your bones?” He bursts out laughing, a big, delighted smile on his face, and nods. Okay, here goes, all your questions answered. You ease down his shorts and reveal…

Uh. Hipbones. Like you learned about in anatomy class. For a second, you’re bewildered, and then for another second you’re furiously embarrassed - he’s a skeleton, for fuck’s sake, __________, what the hell did you expect? - and then, you hear the tiniest snicker, and you begin to shake your head. 

“Sans.” 

“sorry.” He manages to force the word out, waits a second, then absolutely loses it in a fit of laughter. 

“Sans.” You try again, trying not to smile yourself. Damn him! This is so ridiculous but his laughter is contagious. You’re sitting there, butt naked, laughing with a skeleton because you can’t see his dick. This is the weirdest day of your entire life. 

“sorry. sorry. really rude. i’m an ass. just, the look on your face.” He finally gasps. You shake your head slowly, still laughing, and murmur, 

“Give me something to work with, bonehead.” He manages to compose himself after another second. 

“k. k.” He concentrates for a second, and it glows into view. 

Yup. That’s probably the biggest…

Definitely the bluest…

Hoo boy. 

Suddenly, you feel very serious. Joking time is over. Tentatively, you sit up, and reach out, running your fingers very lightly over the shaft. He grunts very quietly, and that feeling of magic, raw and intoxicating, runs through your arm. Oh, wow, okay, that’s something you probably should have realized would happen, but… Feeling giddy, you wrap your fingers around him, and stroke him experimentally.

“ffuck.” He whispers harshly. 

“That okay?” You whisper.

“ **y e s.** ” He says, very quickly. You can’t help but feel a little pleased with yourself at that. Okay, maybe more than a little. 

Okay, maybe you shouldn’t blame Sans for any smug expressions. 

Feeling a little more confident that, other than the, uh, color ... and the light … and the magic, that this isn’t much different from a human guy, you lean forward, carefully licking the head. He shivers and groans again, his eyesockets screwing shut for a moment before opening quickly, like he can’t stand not to watch you while this happens. You’re busy reeling as the sensation of magic is magnified - for a second, it’s almost too much, and then you’re more awake, more determined, than you think you’ve ever been. You don’t hesitate a second longer, you slide your lips around him and begin to bob, your hand working what you can’t manage in your mouth. 

This has never been your favorite sex act - well, you’re not sure you ever had a favorite to start with - and you certainly can’t recall ever having a very good time doing it, but right now, fuck! For once, your brain isn’t spitting out those thoughts about how uncomfortable this is, how your hair keeps getting in your eyes, your concern that you might look weird from this angle. All of that just doesn’t enter the equation this time. All you care about is making your strange, hilarious, perfect boyfriend feel half as good as he’d made you, about the magic in your chest and his hands (suddenly knotted in your hair) and the desperate, hoarse gasps he’s making, half absolutely filthy swears, half your name as sweet as anyone’s ever said it. 

It doesn’t take him terribly long, in the end, which you almost regret when you’re thinking about it later. “gotta… fuck… babe, i’m gonna…” He’s straining, trying to hold off so you can move away, but you have no intention of doing so. He gasps for a second more, then, when you make eye contact with him and very deliberately bob down again, making your decision clear, he groans your name, almost disbelievingly, and begins to release. A jet of something with a taste that eludes description hits the back of your tongue for a second before you swallow… and swallow… and swallow. Aw, you think, fleetingly, your poor boy was all pent up. When he finally finishes, you very slowly pull your lips away and look at him. He’s a disheveled mess with the biggest grin you’ve ever seen plastered to his face. And you, you are smug as all hell, and now that the giddy, charged feeling of magic has faded (er, mostly; apparently, there were consequences in swallowing you hadn’t really thought about), you want nothing more than to curl up next to him and be held for a little bit before you pass out. But, you know guys, at least, the very few guys you’ve been with like this, he’ll want to get up and leave or play on his phone, or… 

He sits up, wraps both arms around you, and pulls you down, then tucks the covers around you both, kissing you softly. And, god, you feel sappy just thinking it, but you feel so treasured at that moment that you barely know what to do. 

“It was okay?” It’s your turn to check. He nods so enthusiastically that you have to grin, and kisses you again. 

“________, i… i really, uh ... like you.” He whispers, and you get that sense again, that he’s dancing around a different word that neither of you are ready for. “like… a lot. like… holy shit, i like you. don’t go, okay? not without giving me a chance to fix whatever’s wrong?” He’s suddenly so serious that you nearly have emotional whiplash, but you see the look in his eye and nod quickly. 

“I’m not going to. I’m not going anywhere.” You say quietly. There’s a comfortable silence for a few minutes, where he’s just stroking your hair and you’re taking the opportunity to explore his spine without his shirt in the way. “I like you too, Sans.” You whisper after a moment’s thought. “More than I can remember liking anyone, for a long long time. It’s a little scary.”

“i know.” He murmurs. “feels…”

“Vulnerable.” You suggest, and he nods.

“exactly.” You look into each other’s eyes for a moment, both of you thinking about this. “but… we’re a team, right? like you said?” He finally speaks up again. “we got each other’s backs? so, it’s okay.” You nod, a small smile on your face. 

“Yeah. We’re a team. We’re a family.” You agree, a little sleepily. He grins at that, then nods.

“right. family.” He says, sounding rather happy with that conclusion, and strokes your hair laconically once more. “night, _______.” 

“Night, Sans.” You whisper, and kiss him one last time before closing your eyes. For the third night in a row, sleep comes easier than you can believe. 

\--------------------------------------

For once, you’re woken up by nothing more upsetting than an alarm. You almost don’t believe it. You’re ready for, god, who next? Papyrus? Alphys? Fuck, Jerry? Someone’s gotta be busting down the door, right? But, no, it’s Christmas Eve, it’s calm, and Sans is grumbling and flailing about for the alarm, and you are just naked as hell. You snicker quietly, reaching over Sans for the alarm, and shut it off. 

“Not ready to wake up?” You tease gently. 

“three more hours.” He begs, and you roll your eyes. 

“Fine, sleepybones. I’m gonna shower and make breakfast for everyone. You can have as long as it takes until Papyrus comes to wake you up.”

“nnn… stay… wait until i’m awake, then shower.” He attempts to bargain. You roll your eyes, kiss his forehead, and slide out of bed, feeling only a little self conscious, and hustle to the en suite bathroom, grabbing clothes haphazardly on the way. Twenty minutes later, you feel like a brand new, only mildly sinful person. 

That illusion is shattered when you bump into Undyne downstairs in the kitchen, because she just takes one look at you and smirks. 

“Had a good night?” She drawls. You manage a frown for about point two seconds, then nod, blushing, unable to help yourself. She gives you her widest, toothiest grin. “Because… I mean, it sounded like you had a pretty good night.” She says, so sweetly it makes your teeth hurt. 

“NO.” You groan, slapping your forehead. Oh, fucking hell, that is furiously embarrassing. 

“Yeah.” She says, smiling (impossibly) wider. 

“Did… Paps?” You manage. She shakes her head quickly. 

“Stayed up with Mettaton all night, don’t worry. Bacon?” Well that’s a small relief. And bacon sounds pretty damn good. You nod slowly, trying to determine if you’re irritated at her eavesdropping - or if it even was eavesdropping, or if you’re just embarrassingly loud - and are just grabbing a cup of coffee when Mettaton walks in, looking quite serious. 

“________, darling, does anyone know your driveway gate combination that isn’t present here?” He says, sounding like he’s trying a little too hard to be casual. 

“Uh, no. Why?” You say quickly. He grimaces. 

“I was in the sunroom doing yoga, and I noticed a car coming down the driveway.” 

“What?” Very quickly, you walk towards the front of the house, clutching your hot coffee like a lifeline, and squint out the window. There, parked next to Undyne's car, is a shiny red Mercedes Benz. 

“Do you know who’s that is?” Undyne asks over your shoulder. You grimace. 

“I’ve got a pretty good idea.” You say, scowling. Just then, the driver’s side door opens. Ugh, even from a distance, you’d recognize that permanently sour face anywhere. 

“Aw, hell no!” Undyne spits. You grimace, watching her shuffle forward down the front path to the door, like every step is specifically inconveniencing her and her alone. 

“Ugh. Horrid. Do you want me to get rid of her, love?” Mettaton sighs. You think for a second, then shake your head. 

“No. Better find out what she wants.” You whisper. “Besides.” You give the two of them a very sardonic smile. “It would be rude to turn away family.”


	32. In Which You Forget A Cup of Coffee in the Sunroom (Where It Will Probably Stay For a Few Weeks)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey rascals.  
> Do your homework!  
> (And don't be reading this if you're not old enough to read this, jeezy peets, you guys!)
> 
> Love,
> 
> Very Elderly Practically A Pile of Dust TST
> 
> PS: No Fanart Corner Today, so instead, a valuable [insight into how I plan a new chapter](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137075792026/please-observe-the-meticulous-planning-that-goes)

The doorbell rings, and your feeling of determination sinks slightly. Ugh, you just… you don’t want to have to interact with her at all. She was the one who made this choice, though, you remind yourself, she was the one who had gone on national TV and tried to humiliate you. You had merely responded. 

“Want me to answer it?” Undyne asks, when the bell rings again. You groan, and shake your head, setting your coffee down on a table in the sunroom adjoining the foyer. 

“No. Better go get her. Where’s Papyrus and Alphys?” 

“Asleep in the TV room, still.” Mettaton says quietly. “Do you want me to wake them?”

“No, no, I just want to make sure that Paps isn’t around if she starts saying awful stuff, okay?” You say. “Can you guys make sure that she doesn’t get to him?” There’s the sound of barking outside, and you grimace. L.D.’s found her. Oh, god, just stay doglike, L.D., you beg mentally, walking quickly over to the foyer, trailed by Mettaton and Undyne. You swing the door open just before she’s about to ring again, having scooched as physically far away from Lesser Dog as possible while still being on the front step. L.D. is growling softly, and Paula looks a strange combination of terrified and disgusted. Well, she always kind of looks disgusted, that’s nothing new. 

“L.D., c’mere.” You urge, and he shoots Paula one last withering look before trotting inside on all fours, wiping each paw neatly on the carpet and sitting by Undyne’s feet. Paula follows this with her eyes, the scowl in her jowly face etching deeper when she realizes that you’re not alone, and who your guests are. Then, of course, she manages a smile. 

“_________. Sweetie. It’s been too long.” She says, and before you know it, she’s hugging you. She smells like baby powder and something else, like the stale, spilled beer scent of a recycling center. L.D. growls again, and Undyne mutters something foul under her breath. Your arms stay locked at your sides, refusing to touch her more than necessary.

“Aunt Paula. Wow. I really didn’t figure I’d be seeing you ever again.” You say, stepping back the second it’s feasible to do so. She frowns at you. Oof, these last few years have been rough on her. The last time you’d seen her, she’d still been young and somewhat fit, but now… well, it’s worst in her face. That permanently puckered sour lemon expression has etched deep lines around her mouth; it’s a face that’s most comfortable frowning. 

“But sweetie, we’re family.” She says, that old familiar tune. “I was so hurt, when you stopped reaching out.” You goggle at her, astonished. 

“Me? Stop reaching out? Paula, you changed your phone number and moved away with my money!” You exclaim bitterly, then shake your head when she gasps, like she’s never been so insulted. “Don’t do that. Don’t act like this is a surprise or an exaggeration. Let’s just be honest. Tell me why you’re here, and we’ll get this over with.” You scowl. 

She glares at you for a second, then says, “Sweetie, you said some very hurtful things about me on television the other day. I’m going to need you to schedule another interview and say they aren’t true.” You let out a wild laugh.

“Like hell I am.” You say, crossing your arms. God, she’s a big woman, sure, but she seems so much smaller than she was when you were ten! “I told the truth and you know it. You can’t even say that I lied, there’s records at the bank showing where all the money went. I’m sure I could find records of the report my teacher filed too.”

“Yeah, face it, you’re done making money off of her.” Undyne can’t help but interject. Paula gives the three of you a sickly smile. 

“You shouldn’t be hanging around with those _things_ , sweetie. You sleep with dogs, you end up with fleas, I’ve always told you that.” Finally, you begin to feel something other than disbelief that she has the nerve to show up here.

“These are my friends. You don’t call them ‘things.’ You don’t talk to them, understand?” You snap, feeling your hand form a fist. “They might be monsters, but they’re more human than you are, you piece of-”

“You should be very careful what you say.” She hisses. “Do you know what I am now? Do you know what I do?” Her tone is so deadly, you actually fall quiet. “You think I don’t recognize these … monsters you’re consorting with, and god knows what else? I saw them all on TV, all your new friends, the day they tore the barrier down and swarmed out like army ants. They’re all friends. All thick as thieves with that big cow. You know her, I’m sure. The disgusting filth that stole my baby.” She spits. 

You can’t help it, you take a step backwards.

“What?”

“Wait, what?” Undyne repeats, astonished. 

“heh.” There’s a new voice from the top of the stairs, but you can’t even spin to look at Sans, still trying to process this news. You can hear him walking slowly down the stairs to join your small group. “you know, i’ve been waiting for a long time to meet you.” He’s saying casually. Paula looks up over your shoulder, her face going a little pale. 

“You.” She spits. “You’re the worst one of all of them. Always on the news, those disgusting bones all over my baby. When I get ‘em back, I’m going to have you murdered for touching them, you freak, I’m going to have every bone of your body smashed, you and that other one-”

“NO.” You snap, stepping forward again. “Paula, I’m warning you-”

“y’know, it took a long time for the kiddo to open up and talk to me.” Sans is saying. “long time, before they’d explain why a kid like them would take off up the mountain in the middle of the night, even knowing that kids had disappeared up there. took a hell of a long time to admit why they wanted to disappear, why they fell down with nothing but dirty clothes and a dirty bandage.” He’s next to you now, speaking a little louder over the growl of L.D., who sounds furious. 

“Oh, holy hell.” Mettaton breathes, suddenly understanding. 

“Frisk?” Undyne whispers, and there it is again, that rare crackle of magic from her, and you don’t need to turn around to know that there’s a spear in her hand. 

“Guys. Don’t hurt her.” You mutter softly. Sans is all toothy smiles next to you, and Paula’s suddenly looking like she bit off a bit more than she could chew, herself. 

“kid said their mom was embarrassed to have a deaf kid. took ‘em out of school ‘cuz it cost too much. stopped learning signs when they were just five. frisk was so embarrassed.” He says. “must have felt like their own mom chopped out their tongue, ya know?” He shuffles his weight to the other foot, arching an eyebrow. “took ‘em a few more months to admit why they were so good at dodging. suppose it must have been almost like a vacation, underground, when your mom’s always trying to beat the shit out of you topside.” 

You reel. All of this is just so much, all at once. Frisk is Paula’s kid. Of course Frisk is Paula’s kid, Frisk is a kid from Mt. Ebott who fell down and had absolutely nobody looking for them. You should have realized it, should have realized that Paula hadn’t been cut out to be a mom the last time you’d seen her, her belly swollen and her eyes dull and resentful? How many people as shitty as Paula could there possibly be in this town, that a kid in their charge could disappear and nobody would notice. Hell, it had happened to you too! 

“You think anyone’s going to believe that? All I need to say is that you freaks brainwashed my baby with your magic, and I’ll have Frisk back, just like that. Unless…” She drawls. Your heart plummets. Here it is, the catch. You should have seen this coming. 

“What do you want.” You spit. 

“The house.” She says easily. “It’s mine, rightfully, anyway, your parents left it to me-”

“They left it to me!” You snap. “They asked you to take care of it while I was a kid, because my dad was dumb enough to think that even his jealous little sister had some good in her!”

“They left it to me.” She repeats, as if you hadn’t said anything at all. 

“y’know.” Sans interjects. “i was pretty messed up, when _________ told me what you did to her. i couldn’t imagine a human leaving a little kid on their own like that. combined that with what frisk told me and i was starting to have a pretty low opinion on how humans care for their kids. but, hey, now it makes sense. kind of a gift, knowing it’s always been you.” He says, smiling so big, so insincere, that it almost hurts you to look at him, his eyes as black as the space between stars. Paula twitches slightly, recoiling even as she tries to look aloof and menacing. Your boyfriend can be a terrible thing to witness, on occasion. 

“I’ll give you some time. Let’s say until New Years, to pack up. If you’re not out by then, I’ll go to the courts, tell them I’m Frisk’s mom, and that I was _scared that the freaks would hurt me._ Or worse, my poor baby.” She pronounces deliberately. “You’re always trying to do the right thing, ________. If you really think I’m such a bad person, the last thing you’ll want is me getting my baby back. Give me my house, and an interview clearing my name from all the terrible things you’ve said about me, and we’ll call it even.” 

“Sans, Undyne, _don’t._ ” You say quickly, feeling, rather than seeing, them both preparing to eviscerate her. Undyne growls, and Sans looks plaintively over at you, just begging you to change your mind. You’re incredibly tempted. “Get the hell out of here, Paula.” You snap, before your good sense leaves you. “I’m not giving you shit. If you’re smart, you’ll forget you had the guts to come here and ask me any of this.” 

“New Years.” She repeats. “I’ll be waiting.” She backs slowly out of the still open door and shuts it with a very final slam. 

“You’re not giving up the house.” Undyne says quickly. 

“Absolutely not, darling.” Mettaton adds, pacing forward. “Oh, that… beast!” 

“‘m actually gonna kill her.” Sans says, matter of factly. You roll your eyes. 

“No you’re not.” You say, gritting your teeth as your mind churns sluggishly. “Oh, god, I need to call Toriel. Like, right now.”

“I’ve got her number.” Undyne says, then blinks. “_________, Frisk is your cousin!” You take a deep breath, trying to process this. 

“This is a lot.” You mutter. “Jeez, I suppose I couldn’t ask for a better cousin, huh…”

“neither could frisk.” Sans says. “________, don’t do anything stupid, okay?” You turn to look at him and are surprised when Undyne and Mettaton and even Lesser Dog all nod in agreement. 

“What?” You sputter. 

“We know you.” Undyne drawls. “It would be just like you to give up your house so that Frisk doesn’t have to go through anything more.” You open your mouth to snap at her, then close it again, slowly. Damn it. Damn her. 

“She’s not going to win this time, love.” Mettaton says softly. 

“you recorded all that, right, bud?” Sans checks with Mettaton. Mettaton nods, and you realize why the robot had been so quiet; he’d been attempting to gather evidence.

“Naturally, but the cow didn’t admit to a blasted thing.” He sighs, running a hand through his glossy hair. 

“still, that’s a threat, what she said. we can use that, probably.” Sans is muttering. He pauses for a second, looking up at you, and you’re relieved to see the light back in his eyes. “you know, it would be so easier if everyone just looked the other way and i dunked on her.” 

“No dunking.” You and Undyne say simultaneously, and share a small smile. 

“Wow. I have a cousin though. I have a blood relative that I like.” You whisper, a little giddy all of a sudden, before your heart plummets. “Oh, god, Frisk is going to hate me, I brought their mom back in the picture -”

“Hey. No. Paula did that.” Undyne says. “If we’re not allowed to blame ourselves for the things that people have done to you, then you’re definitely not allowed to blame yourself for this, right?” She glares at you, until you nod reluctantly. 

“Right, right. I need to see Toriel and Frisk. This is big. I need to talk to them both face to face.” You whisper. “Oh, I feel so bad, breaking bad news on Christmas Eve, they’re probably so excited…” 

“Darling, you’ll be giving Frisk a wonderful present.” Mettaton says, resting a cool hand on your back. “They’ve been hurt so badly, and now they’ll know that there’s humans in their family who’ll love them.” You take a deep breath, trying to see things this way. 

“he’s right.” Sans mutters. “frisk always knew that their mom might pop up again. they’ve been waiting for a long time, for the other shoe to drop. it’ll be a relief, to know for sure what she’s planning on doing.” You take a deep breath, looking at him. 

“I’m gonna need your help, talking to them. I need to make sure I’m being clear, and my signs just aren’t there yet.” You say, your head spinning with a thousand different thoughts. “Oh, god, there’s so much I need to tell Frisk. I need to tell them that it wasn’t their fault, that their mom has always been like this… I need to tell them about their aunt and uncle, and how much they would have loved Frisk…” You say, breathing quickly, then realize; “I think I need to sit down.”

“hey, hey. ‘s ok.” Sans whispers. “c’mon, undyne will ask frisk and tori to come over, you and i can grab some coffee and think about what you wanna say, okay?” He checks. You nod slowly. Coffee. Coffee would be good. You only get one run at this conversation. “k. mettaton, can you wake up my brother and alphys and tell ‘em what’s up.”

“Of course, darling.” Mettaton pats Sans’ shoulder absently as he walks deeper into the house, and you have to smile a little. You like it when they get along. 

“c’mon, babe.” Sans urges. “forget her. we’re gonna think of something, all of us.” He tugs your hand, and you nod, watching Undyne pull up Toriel’s number on her phone over your shoulder as he leads you towards the kitchen. They all say Frisk isn’t going to hate you, and they all say that you shouldn’t give up the house to Paula to make this easier on your poor cousin.

God, you hope they’re right.


	33. In Which The Alternate Title is "Quicher, Yet Quicher"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahahahah oh my god I am so sorry for how ridiculous this chapter ended up

You collapse on one of the barstools in the kitchen, putting your elbows up on the counter. Sans, eager to make himself useful, hurries to get you a mug of coffee and a plate with bacon and a slice of quiche on it. God, the monsters all make such good food. Toriel makes amazing food, snail pie notwithstanding. Frisk is going to be so upset that their human relative is such a disappointment-

“hey.” Sans says quickly. You glance up at him. He’s looking at you, worried. 

“What?” You say quietly, your brow knitting. 

“you don’t, uh… look okay.” He mutters. “what can i do? can i fix it? let me fix it.” You narrow your eyes at the anxious skeleton, suddenly certain that he’s been watching your soul, and feeling pretty certain that it’s cheating, being able to see exactly when you’re freaking out the most. 

“You can’t fix it.” You say softly. He frowns. “I’m just… anxious. And upset. God, I hate her!” You hiss. He steps closer to you, and very tentatively touches your back. 

“she’s the worst human i’ve ever met. almost.” He mutters. 

“Sans.” You sigh, and reveal your biggest concern, the one that’s been building since Paula spoke to you. “I could have stopped her from hurting Frisk. When I was younger, if I’d had the guts, if I’d realized she probably was just all talk, that she wouldn’t hurt Ghost if I talked to the authorities-”

“no.” He says firmly. “you can’t do that. it’ll drive you nuts. you can’t go back and play ‘what would have been.’” He’s looking very seriously at you, more serious than you think you’ve ever seen him. “time is weird, ________. trust me. you can’t predict how a choice will change things. you just have to do what seems right, and hope for the best.” You open your mouth to argue, but he shakes his head. “you’re going to have to trust me, babe.” He whispers. “i might not be much older than you, but i have played this game you’re playing for _lifetimes_. i told you before. time, space, they’re all mixed up together. it’s like this big weird soup.” You look at him, raising an eyebrow. “you can’t wonder what things would be like if you just changed that one thing.” He whispers passionately. “not if you’re not able to change it. and frisk…” He takes a deep breath. 

“look, frisk is special. frisk is very, very special. i don’t know how they’re the way they are, but… the kid sees a lot. they never give up, either. if frisk wanted things to work out differently, if they wanted you to have done something different, i really don’t doubt that they woulda done it.” He says, gritting his teeth. God, you just can’t understand what he’s trying to say, and you feel so bogged down with your concerns right now that you don’t even know what questions to ask. 

“I still keep thinking Frisk is gonna hate me.” You say unhappily, feeling determined not to let this message sink in. 

“the kiddo’s gonna love knowing that you’re their cousin. you’re easy to love.” Sans says, totally focused. You think about that, then take a gulp of coffee, trying to process your emotions while your face is hidden behind the mug. 

“__________! METTATON SAYS THAT YOU’RE FRISK’S COUSIN! WHAT WONDERFUL NEWS!” Papyrus comes charging in as you’re still hiding. You grimace and put the cup down. Sans is watching him, but doesn’t interject. 

“You think Frisk is going to think so, Paps?” You ask him, smiling in spite of yourself when you look at him; he’s got Ghost perched on his shoulder like a parrot, and Ghost is rumbling with purrs. Your cat is so happy ever since all these people arrived. It’s funny, you never thought of him as being lonely, you thought he liked it that way. Then again, you thought much the same about yourself. 

“OBVIOUSLY.” Papyrus says, a note of superiority in his voice. “HUMANS CAN BE SO SILLY, SANS.” You look at him, seeing the expression on his face, like you’re missing something that’s totally obvious, and sigh, smiling a little. 

“You’re a really great friend, Papyrus.” You murmur. 

“THE GREAT PAPYRUS IS A GREAT EVERYTHING!” Papyrus says, grinning, but then he very carefully pats your head, the way he would with Lesser Dog. Ghost takes the opportunity to jump onto the counter from his shoulder, and immediately begins butting in on your bacon, stealing the entire strip from your plate. Oh, hell, he can have it. You smile at the cat, but Sans is frowning. 

“you gonna eat?” 

“Mhm.” You say, taking another sip of coffee. “Are you?” He squints at you, but he can’t get away with lecturing you for not eating if he’s doing the same thing, and he knows it. 

“fine.” He pulls up the stool next to yours, sliding the quiche in front of him and grabbing a slice with his bare hand. Pointedly, he takes a bite, and you feel sorry for a second, thinking about the effort it probably takes for him to have to digest human food. Then again, he’d said he needed to eat, he just didn’t like the process… you grimace, and take a bite of your own slice. It’s wonderful. 

“Sans, did you make this?” You ask, feeling a little perked up already. “It’s really good!” Sans blushes slightly, and Papyrus laughs. 

“YOU DON’T NEED TO BE SO NICE TO HIM, HE KNOWS IT’S STUPID TO MAKE A PIE OUT OF EGGS AND HAM.” Papyrus insists, petting your head again.

“‘s called a quiche, bro. tori taught me, i’ve showed you so many times-”

“EGGS BELONG IN CARBONARA! NOT PIES!” Papyrus insists, and you grin, particularly when Sans reaches over and begins rubbing your back once more. It’s hard to wallow when you have people like these. 

\----------------------------

You sit there, munching through two slices of quiche - Sans admits that it’s more fusion cuisine, half human food, half magic - until the doorbell rings. 

“THAT MUST BE FRISK AND TORIEL!” Papyrus sounds delighted. You feel… well, anxious, in spite of yourself and all the encouragement Sans and Papyrus have given you. 

“‘s gonna be fine.” Sans says. “c’mon, we got this.” He hops down from the stool and leans up to give you a quick kiss when you do the same. You give him an anxious smile, then walk quickly towards the door - you don’t want to leave them waiting outside, especially with the photographers outside the fence. 

You open the door, and Toriel and Frisk are there, waiting for you, both looking a little worried. Toriel steps forward at once, wrapping you in a hug that’s so maternal that it almost makes you sniffly. 

“My child.” She says quietly. “Undyne called and said that you had something very important to tell both of us. We came as soon as we could.” You take a deep breath. 

“Yeah. I do. Please, come in.” You urge. They do so, Frisk stomping the snow off their boots with big, exaggerated leaps that make Toriel frown and you grin in spite of yourself. You glance over your shoulder, and feel a bit of relief when you see Sans waiting for you. “Is it okay if Sans helps me out with this? My signing isn’t there yet.” You murmur. “And I don’t want you on translation duty, Toriel, this is about you, too.” Toriel nods quickly. “We should probably be sitting down.” You say, after a moment’s thought. “I’m sorry, I’m being really rude, I should be offering you tea or something-”

“Not at all, child.” Toriel says, and Frisk nods. “We both just want to know what has you upset.” Frisk tugs on Toriel’s sleeve and signs, their fingers a blur. 

“kiddo’s saying that they want to make it better, whatever’s wrong.” Sans translates, at your elbow. You smile at Frisk. 

“Me too, buddy.” You say, then nod towards the very rarely used sitting room. “Here, let’s sit down and talk.” The two monsters and Frisk follow you in, and Toriel and Sans choose stern floral armchairs to sit in, while Frisk hops up next to you on the loveseat. You hesitate, then look at the small collective. 

“I hope I can say this right.” You say, and clear your throat. “Frisk, Toriel, I don’t know how much you’ve been told about me. A lot of my personal life has been leaked on the news, but… just in case, let me tell. I grew up in this house, with my mom and dad.” You say quietly, feeling Toriel and Sans’ eyes on you, Frisk’s eyes glued not to Sans, who is signing along, but to your mouth, reading your lips. “They died, when I was a little older than you, Frisk.” You whisper. “And my aunt, she was supposed to take care of me. She, uh, she didn’t, though. She stole my parents money, and left me on my own for months at a time, and, um, when she got pregnant, she left me for good. Her name … god, I’m so sorry, it was Paula _______.” You whisper. For a second, there’s silence, then Toriel whispers,

“But… that’s what Frisk told me their mother was… OH.” Realization strikes, and her eyes go round and wide. You only look at her for a second, but you’re more concerned with Frisk at the moment. They’ve stopped moving, and are staring at you, chalk white, their mouth hanging slightly open. There’s a long second where nothing happens, then Frisk gulps and begins to sign. Sans is watching.

“uh, the kiddo wants to know if she… hurt you. if she threw things at you.” He whispers roughly. You swallow, and nod at frisk.

“Yeah. God, I’m so sorry, Frisk, I keep thinking-” You stop talking as Frisk sniffs, then launches into a fury of signing. 

“then you know.” Sans translates, while Toriel gapes at you. “you know what she was like, you know why i left, you know-”

“It wasn’t your fault, Frisk.” You say quickly. “No matter what anyone says, it wasn’t your fault, she’s always been like that, and I’m never, ever, ever going to let her hurt you again, okay? Over my dead body. I will never let that happen, sweetie, from now on you’ve got a family member who’s gonna look out for you-”

“Cousin.” Toriel whispers. “You’re my child’s cousin.” You meet her eyes, and see them swimming with tears. 

“I am.” You murmur. “I’m so sorry, Frisk, I didn’t know any more than you did, but I’m here now, okay, and I’m going to be here for you for as long as you want me around-” You’re cut off as Frisk scrabbles forward, almost on all fours, across the loveseat to sling their arms around your neck, clinging tightly to you. You gasp, then hug Frisk tightly, feeling the slight body shake as they hold onto you with all their might. 

“I’m gonna be there for you.” You whisper, knowing Frisk can’t see. 

“she’ll be there, bud.” Sans translates quietly. “she’s your family and she’s nothing like your mom, and she understands what you’ve been through.” Well, that’s a bit of editorializing, but you don’t care, you’re so happy that Frisk is happy right now, all you want to do is hug the little squirt forever. Frisk breaks away with a little sniff, and does a sign you recognize, crossing their arms over their chest, then pointing at you. You give them a crooked, slightly teary smile. It’s funny, crying right now doesn’t feel at all shameful, and you wonder, very briefly, if Sans had done anything when he handled your soul to make you feel so okay with this overpouring of emotion. 

“I love you too, Frisk.” You whisper. “I don’t know you very well yet, but I’m going to be the family you deserve, okay? I’m going to tell you all about the family you never got to meet, and I’m going to go to your school plays and your science fairs and I’m going to be a part of your life, as long as your mom’s okay with it.” You remember Toriel, and look up at her. She’s sniffling too, but then she jumps out of her chair and grabs you both up in a hug, one under each arm, and holds you tight. 

“What a wonderful gift.” She says. “What a wonderful, wonderful gift.” 

You don’t care that your feet can’t touch the ground, not when you’re being hugged like you haven’t been hugged since your mom passed. “Oh, my children.” She’s whispering. “I am so glad that you have found each other. I am so very glad.” 

You smile faintly against the crushed velvet of her robes, then pull your face away, remembering something. 

“Toriel, wait, there’s more.” You say urgently. 

“Oh!” Toriel sets you and Frisk back down on the couch, and settles back in her seat almost instantly. She’s so light on her feet, even despite her size, but right now, you’re so far beyond jealous that she and Sans are close, and that she’s warm and graceful and all the things you tell yourself you aren’t. Hell, you’re glad - it’ll be a lot easier if Frisk’s mom already loves your boyfriend, and right now, all you can think of is how to be a good family to Frisk. 

“Paula showed up on my doorstep this morning and told me all of this.” You say, reaching out and rubbing Frisk’s back absently as you talk. “She, uh, she must have run out of my parents’ money, because she showed up… god, I’m so sorry. She said I should give her this house, or she’d try to fight for custody of Frisk in court.” You murmur. “Look, look, if it were just me, I’d do it in a heartbeat, okay, I want the world for you, Frisk, but Papyrus and Sans live here too and -”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Toriel says, sitting up straight. “Oh, that cow, she thinks she’ll kick my niece out of her home!?” She stamps a foot, as you try not to grin yourself absolutely silly. 

Niece. 

“Absolutely not, not in a billion years!” Toriel is continuing. “I am the Queen of all monsters, am I not? And I have the finest lawyers, and the most gold, and my dear friend the king, and I will never, ever bow to a bully like that!” She says, indignant. Frisk is nodding, their adorable bob basically a blur as they make their agreement with that sentiment clear. “Don’t you worry, _______! She’ll regret the day she tried to mess with my family!” She says, a fire in her eyes, and Frisk hops off the couch to hop on her lap and hug her tight, then jumps down to do the same to you, staying perched on your lap after they slack off from the hug. 

“Really?” You whisper. “You’re not mad?” 

“Never, my child.” Toriel says, and Frisk shakes their head urgently. “We both know how she is, and we are never going to be bullied by her again, and neither are you!” 

A slow, disbelieving smile crosses your face, growing bigger and bigger as Frisk pats your back and Toriel smiles at the two of you and Sans winks very slowly. 

“Well. In that case.” You say, feeling like you’ve been absolutely wrung out. “Would you all like some cocoa?”

\--------------------------------

It takes you a long time to make it to the kitchen - Toriel keeps hugging you, and Frisk is riding on your back, and you’re just dizzy with relief and happiness. Sans decides to give you some time to yourself, saying, 

“better go tell everyone the good news.” He leans up towards you and you kiss him without thinking, then turn beet red when you feel Toriel and Frisk looking at you. Frisk gives you a very mischievous grin once Sans has left, and hops off your back - they’re insisting on making the cocoa themselves. Toriel, too, has a twinkle in her eye, and she takes your hand, sitting down at the kitchen table with you while Frisk bangs around in your fridge and cabinets, finding milk and cocoa and sugar and a big pot to mix it in. 

“Well, it seems that there’s plenty of good news to go around, my niece.” She says, smiling. “Oh, goodness, Frisk has been calling him Uncle Sans, but that might be a bit confusing now!” You inhale sharply, and then when Toriel breaks out in tinkling laughter, you can’t help but do the same. 

“I, um, I care for him very much.” You admit, still blushing. 

“Yes, I can tell.” Toriel says happily. “Oh, wonderful, I was beginning to worry the two of you hadn’t figured it out when we all had dinner together. Not that that rogue, Mettaton, was helping any!” She beams at you, and you duck your head.

“Honestly, um?” You hear yourself saying, quite in spite of your better judgment. “I thought that maybe you and Sans were, uh…” You trail off, and Toriel blushes prettily, the pink shining through the white fur of her face. 

“Goodness, no! He’s much too young for me!” She laughs, shaking her head. “Then again, there are very few people who aren’t…” 

“Then you and the king, you aren’t…” You start, then trail off, seeing Frisk nodding eagerly, and Toriel shaking her head. 

“To be honest, dear one, I’m uncertain how to proceed in that regard.” Frisk is signing urgently, and Toriel shakes her head. “Oh, I know what you think, love.” She mutters. “But I… oh, I don’t know. Frisk, do stir gently!” She scolds, then glares as Frisk puts down your wooden spoon to sign. “Undyne doesn’t know everything, child!” She says. Frisk sighs, then begins to stir again with exaggerated slowness. 

Once the cocoa is done, Frisk sits down right next to you and begins to ask questions. You sip out of your mug and answer as best as you can, all about what your mom and dad were like, what it was like growing up on your own, how you and Ghost got by, the things you wish you’d been there to see, or that Frisk could have seen. After a while, Toriel has to make a phone call, but she calls Sans in to translate, and Sans picks up right where Toriel had left off. Soon, all the monsters are gathered round in the kitchen, listening. They’re the perfect audience; they laugh at all the happy stories, frown or grumble at all the sad ones. They have questions, too, about growing up human and not having magic, that they’ve all been too shy to ask, so you do your best to entertain them all. 

After that, it’s your turn. You ask about the underground, about how Frisk had ended up there, and bit by bit, piece by piece, you get the tale of the nightmare that Frisk had faced when helping earn freedom for the monsters. Nearly everyone present is a little emotional when you’re interrupted, once again, by the doorbell. 

“Oh god, what now.” You mutter. Toriel sits up straighter, brightening slightly. 

“Oh, wonderful, that must be my attorney!” 

“Oh! Gosh, that was fast! I’ll let him in!” You say, standing up. 

“I’ll go with you, darling, just in case.” Mettaton murmurs, detaching from the group. Sans gives him a skeptical look, but then nods, perhaps demonstrating how much trust the robot has gained in the past few days. Mettaton and you walk quickly through the quiet house as you interrogate him. 

“Do you know who this attorney is?” You mutter.

“No, sweet. It could be anyone, I suppose. Nobody dares to turn the queen down, so I imagine she has the best legal representatives imaginable.” Mettaton murmurs, and stops before the door. You shrug, and swing it open.

It’s a monster. Well. It’s a cat. Well, it’s a cat monster. 

He’s tall, and well built, and wearing Ray-Bans and an immaculate gray suit, a perfectly crisp white shirt, a pitch black tie. His black leather shoes gleam. He’s smiling at you, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth, a briefcase in his paw, but the smile fades slightly when he sees Mettaton. He drops the cigarette on the slate paving stones, grinding it out beneath one perfect shoe, and steps inside. 

Mettaton, for once, is speechless. Looking at him, you see the face of someone who’s just experienced a terrible, terrible shock.

“_________. So glad to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you on the news.” The monster is saying, extending his paw. You grasp it after a second, and he shakes your hand commandingly. “Mettaton.” The monster adds, after a moment, nodding at the robot. 

“B-b… Burgerpants?” Mettaton stammers. The cat smiles, a hungry, irritated smile, and removes his sunglasses.

“Actually.” He pronounces clearly. “It’s Lawyerpants, now.”


	34. In Which Ghost Does Not Appear Because He's Hiding Behind The Couch Because There Is A Giant Cat Present

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gosh, you guys really, really liked that I included a certain character recently, right?
> 
> Okay, okay! The people have spoken! From now on, you'll be seeing a lot more of the new CoBC fan favorite!
> 
> That's right!
> 
> Lots!
> 
> More!
> 
> JERRY!
> 
> FANART FOR UR PLEASURE:
> 
> Weirdly, it seems like last chapter made you guys make fanart of [some weirdo?](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137265413891/observe-the-masterpiece-by-mage-marquise)
> 
>  
> 
> [Some weirdo who isn't Jerry???](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137266615501/mod2amaryllis-if-you-havent-read-chill-or-be)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Ugh, fine. Nobody likes Jerry. So, here you go, just in case you didn't read it in the comments yesterday:  
> [Lawyerpants Origins](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137210958451/alright-but-seriously-here-tst-if-you-want-to)
> 
> [](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137210958451/alright-but-seriously-here-tst-if-you-want-to>%20The%20Lawyerpants%20Origin%20Story.</a>)

“Burgerpants-” Mettaton attempts, still looking pale and astonished. 

“ _Lawyerpants._ ” The cat says levelly. 

“B-but, darling, it’s barely been a year, how on earth did you-”

“I. Worked. Hard.” Lawyerpants says, his eyes flashing for a second. Suddenly, you realize just how irritated he is to be in Mettaton’s presence. Mettaton, on the other hand, has lost all composure entirely, and is looking at the cat like a drowning man must look at a lifeguard. 

“Well, naturally, love, you always were a hard worker…”

“Was I?” Lawyerpants says softly, arching an eyebrow, then turns back at you, a cool smile on his face. “In any event, Queen Toriel called me and gave me the basics of your situation. I’m more than happy to do any preemptive work, just in case your aunt makes the decision to follow through on her threat.” He shakes his head slowly at the thought of the blackmail. “Mettaton, incidentally, I’ll need any footage of the interaction you’ve recorded.” He deigns to give the robot a look. 

“Oh! Oh, yes, certainly! What format would you-”

“Whatever is fine.” Lawyerpants says dismissively, his hand moving into his pocket for a cigarette and even producing the package before he remembers that he’s inside a house and that probably isn’t polite. He replaces it, then smiles toothily at you. “Sorry, old habits die hard.” There’s a soft, robotic sigh from behind you. “Would you mind showing me where Toriel is so we can get started?” 

“Oh, yeah, sure. Right this way.” You say quickly, and begin to lead him through the mansion. He glances around with interest as he follows you, his eyes wide and alert. When he steps into the kitchen, he gasps, then gives a genuine smile with none of the polish from before.

“LITTLE BUDDY!” He exclaims. Frisk jumps down from the barstool they’re perched on and sprints over, a huge smile plastered on their face, to jump up into Lawyerpants’ arms. “OH, MAN, buddy!” Lawyerpants is saying, a thick purr under his voice - from this angle, you can see that he has a tail sticking out of his neat suit, which is twitching slightly. “It’s been way too long! You’re okay? You’re not still eating sequins, are you?” Frisk shakes their head quickly, and gestures at Toriel before signing rapidly. Lawyerpants bursts out laughing. “God, glad to hear it, little bud!” He says, then leans his head closer, listening to something you can’t hear as Frisk signs. “It was rough, buddy.” He admits. “Doing three years of law school in one year? Not easy. But hey, I got your drawings in the mail! Great hand turkeys, bud. I even know what turkeys are now!” He laughs, then shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it. I only got one ticket to invite someone to graduation, anyway, and they were a no-show, so…” He trails off, his tail thrashing once, and then he ruffles Frisk’s hair, before smiling at Toriel, regaining his professional appearance. 

“I’m so glad you called, majesty. Things like this are why I went to school in the first place.” Toriel beams at him. 

“Oh, we’re all so proud of you, Lawyerpants.” She says brightly. “And I just know you’ll be able to help us all with this mess.” 

“That’s the plan, majesty.” He says with a cocky grin. “That’s the plan. Mind if I grab a cup of joe?” He asks you suddenly, looking covetously at the coffee machine, which still has some brew percolating on the hot plate. It’s reduced down to something just a few levels before sludge, but it’ll be strong, and Lawyerpants seems pleased by that. 

“Oh, let me get it for you!” Mettaton says, practically tripping over himself to fix Lawyerpants a mug. Lawyerpants accepts it dismissively, then nods at you. 

“Okay, _________. Let’s talk about your Aunt. Mind if we go somewhere private?” Lawyerpants clearly notices Sans and Mettaton exchanging a look, because he adds, “Sometimes it’s a little easier to tell the whole story if you don’t have to worry about an audience.” 

“Oh. Yeah, that makes sense, sure thing.” You say with a smile, and wave at everyone. Sans grins and gives you a wave, Papyrus stares starry-eyed at the lawyer, and Mettaton practically drapes himself across the kitchen island to pass you a cup of coffee too. Oh, good, you’re gonna be extra caffeinated today. You’re getting the sense that you’ll need it. 

\-----------------------------

The interrogation goes on for what feels like forever. Lawyerpants is exacting. If he doesn’t think an answer is clear enough, he’ll push and push until he understands exactly how the event went down. By the time you’re done, he knows every single detail about your childhood with Paula, even the rough stuff. Especially, actually, the rough stuff. He makes it clear that even though it’s hard to talk about, the more info he has, the more ammunition against Paula you’ll be armed with. By the time you’re done, he has the contact information of your probate attorney, an external hard drive loaded with every financial document you’ve saved since you were little, and a very satisfied smile. 

“Is that it?” You say, your throat feeling hoarse. He nods slowly. 

“If I need anything else, I’ll call you.” He says, pulling out his cell phone and handing it to you. You shrug, and punch your number in. “Thanks so much, _________. You’ve done very well. I’ll keep you up to date, and you’ll do the same for me, right?” He checks. You nod and he smiles. “I’ll just go see Toriel and the kid on the way out.” He says, giving you another gleaming smile. 

“Hey, uh, Lawyerpants? Can I ask you a question?” You ask, a little sheepishly.

“Shoot.” He says, giving a shrug. You scuff a foot on the ground. 

“Seems like you’ve got a problem with Mettaton?” You mutter. His smile grows a little less sincere. 

“Oh. Yeah.” He arches an eyebrow. “Back in the underground, he was my boss. Hence: Burgerpants.” He says, forming each syllable precisely. 

You think hard about what it would be like to have Mettaton as a boss, then shiver. He smirks at you, all polished cool. “Don’t worry. The underground was a small place. Everyone knew everyone, almost. It’s not gonna get in the way of your defense, little b-... Er. _________. Sorry.” He suddenly gives you a flustered grin, and you realize that he’s the same age as you, more or less. You grin back at him, and he gives you a shrug, then clears his throat. Suddenly, that cool cat facade is back on his face, and he nods back towards the kitchen. “Shall we?”

“Sure, buddy.” You say, still grinning, and lead the way again. 

\----------------------------

Frisk is heartbroken to see Lawyerpants go. Toriel is calm and sympathetic and appreciative, particularly when Lawyerpants waives aside all talk of payment. “Cases like this, I take pro bono, majesty.” Sans elbows Papyrus.

“heh, thought we were the only _pro boneo-s_ around here.”

Papyrus shrieks in dismay, and you do your best not to grin. Mettaton’s eyes dart between the brothers and Lawyerpants, an eager to please look on his face, as he gives a loud, false laugh at Sans’ joke. He’s clearly worked himself up to a lather while you’ve been gone, because he poses at least seven times on his way across the five feet of hardwood separating him from Lawyerpants. 

“Well, just know, darling. You’re welcome back anytime.” His voice drops, low and seductive, and he gives Lawyerpants his best smouldering gaze. “ _Any. Time._ ” 

Lawyerpants stares at Mettaton, emotionless for a second, then shrugs and winks at Papyrus. 

“Eh, that’s fine. I prefer to do most of my work online. Cooldude95 here knows what I’m talking about.” 

“THAT’S ME! SANS, THAT’S ME! HE KNOWS WHO I AM!” Papyrus yelps, then, very coolly adds, “UH, OBVIOUSLY, EVERYONE KNOWS ME, I’M THE INTERNET COOL GUY.” 

“‘S right, buddy.” Lawyerpants says with another wink. “Alright, all. Again. You call if there’s any problems, okay, you’ve got my number.” You nod, he shakes your hand again, and just like that, he’s gone, striding through the halls of your house like he knows it by heart. 

“Hm. Fine!” Mettaton explains, and stalks over to a corner to sulk. Papyrus is looking at the doorway Lawyerpants had left through with starry eyes, as Frisk, Undyne and Toriel giggle. Sans looks at Papyrus, then the door, then Mettaton, then you. 

“i _like_ that guy.” He says, wonderingly, then gives you a very toothy grin. You roll your eyes, but smile back. 

“Don’t be mean, bonehead. Mettaton’s all worked up.” You say, under your breath. 

“Because my protege has cast me aside like yesterday’s fries!” Mettaton declares dramatically from the corner. 

“Oh, j-jeez, Mettaton, it’s because you were a jerk to him when he worked for you!” Alphys groans, and when Mettaton looks tearily up at the small crowd for a defender, he has to launch into another sulk when nobody speaks up. 

Undyne clears her throat. “Anyyyyway.” She says pointedly. “Oh, hey, _________, Toriel and Frisk can stay the night and have Christmas with us, right?”

“Undyne!” Toriel says, looking awfully embarassed. “Oh, goodness, __________, we didn’t mean to invite ourselves-”

“Hey, hey, please!” You say quickly. “The more the merrier, right! I’d be thrilled. Gosh, I need to go shopping, though, we were gonna have a big feast, right?”

“i’ll take-”

“I’ll take her.” Undyne cuts Sans off, narrowing her eyes. Sans looks affronted. “You had her all last night, it’s my turn.”

“not _all_ last night.” Sans argues, then suddenly realizes the innuendo and blushes bright blue, burying his face in his hands as Undyne begins to chuckle unpleasantly, Mettaton lets out a watery giggle, and Toriel looks at all three of them like she doesn’t know who she should scold first. You’re eying the kitchen table, wondering if there’s enough room to hide under it, when Undyne speaks up. 

“C’mon, don’t be a nerd. We’re great at shopping together, and I’m sure you guys need to do some wrapping, and Toriel and Frisk need to go grab clothes and invite Asgore-”

“What!?” Toriel says, shocked. Undyne grins at her, then puts on a contrite face. 

“You don’t want the poor king, all alone, on Christmas.” She says melancholically, sticking out her lower lip in what she must think is a pout. Toriel opens her mouth, closes it, then opens it again. 

“Goodness, I suppose I don’t.” She whispers, and Frisk nods eagerly, and signs. “Yes, I know Frisk. Oh, we’ll need to get that little computer Alphys made you so that poor _______ isn’t kept out of the loop.” She mutters to herself. 

“HE KNEW I WAS THE INTERNET COOL GUY.” Papyrus mutters to _himself._ He’s totally in his own world of delighted admiration. 

Mettaton lets out another groan of despair. 

Sans glances up at you through his fingerbones, studying you even with the blush on his face. After a second, he sighs, then nods. 

“me and paps need to wrap all our presents anyway. you guys go. be safe.” He cautions. 

“Hah! I always am!” Undyne exclaims. “You ready for food shopping, loser!?” She seems so excited to go, you have to grin and laugh. 

“Heck yeah.” You say, still grinning.

\------------------------------------------------------------

“WELL?” You’re barely in her car before the barrage starts. 

“Oh god.” You come to the slow realization. “You weren’t really psyched about shopping, were you.” 

“I’m excited to have some hangtime with my bestie.” She says with a wide grin. “WELL?” She takes off down the road, and you groan. 

“God, Undyne, what do you want to know?”

“Fuhuhu.” She laughs, smirking. “Was your first encounter with a skeleton to your satisfaction?” She grins wider after a moment. “What I’m saying is, were you, you know, satisfied?” She asks pointedly. You grit your teeth. 

“Who says this is my first encounter with a skeleton?” You drawl. 

“WHAT.” She nearly stops in the middle of the road, and you have to yelp.

“UNDYNE! JUST A JOKE!” She narrows her eyes at you. 

“Don’t DO that to me, nerd!” She growls, and you have the, er, satisfaction, of getting to laugh while she’s all flustered. “Oh, that would be so weird if you’d already been with a skeleton!”

“Right, right, much weirder than being with one now.” You say skeptically, then shrug. “Gosh, I don’t know, Undyne. He’s… he’s the best.” You admit, looking down and smiling. Oh, he really, really is. She glances at you. 

“Woah, we’re not talking sex stuff right now, are we?” She says. You flush. How is this more embarrassing than sex stuff?!

“Uh. No. Well, not just that.” You murmur, looking pointedly out the window. 

“AWWWW! You LoOoOoOvE him!” Undyne crows. “Man, oh man, you’re so lucky you made friends with me so I could give him your number, I’m gonna make an awesome maid of honor! OH! I’m gonna be such a good godmom to your weird hybrid babies-”

“UNDYNE!” You cry, laughing. “Oh. My. God.” She’s laughing like a maniac, so much that you fear for a second you’ll have to take the wheel. 

“What, you can be godmom to me and Alphys’ weird hybrid babies-” She finally attempts to say innocently, then loses it again, and you do too. Even when you’ve pulled into the parking lot, the two of you are laughing like maniacs for a good two minutes. “But seriously.” She finally breathes. “You and Sans-”

“Let’s not go crazy, okay?” You say quickly. “I mean, a lot has happened to me in these past few weeks. A lot. I don’t want to make bad choices or say something I’m not sure I mean, you know, just because everything’s moving so fast?” She looks sympathetically at you. 

“It’s a wartime thing, I think. People get close when there’s a lot of outside threats. God knows I moved in with Alphys right away after the first attacks.” She says seriously. You blink. Wartime. God, you hadn’t been thinking of it like _that._ But then, suddenly, you laugh again. 

“Oh, god, not as fast as Sans moved in with me, we weren’t even a couple yet! We’re barely a couple now!” You insist. She arches an eyebrow. 

“Uh, as someone who got woken up by your, um, coupling, last night-” You groan, cutting her off. 

“Just saying. I really, really care about him. And I don’t want to do anything stupid that might ruin this. I care about all of you.” You say, then give her a quick smile. “Hell, I’ve known you way more than long enough, I don’t feel weird about saying that I love _you._ ” She rolls her eye, then processes this. 

“Awh. Awh, man. Hang on, there’s um, there’s a thing in my eye.” She attempts. You blink, then grin. 

“HA! You love me too!” 

“SHUT UP, NERD!” 

“You love me so much, you love your best friend, you want to be my maid of honor, you want to be my kids’ godddddmother!” You sing. 

_“__________!”_

“Go on, don’t be a coward, say it!” You tease, delighted to have found the one thing that makes Undyne melt into the puddle of embarrassment that she so enjoys putting you in. 

“Agh! I…. love you. YOU HAPPY, NERD?!” She demands, still flushed. You grin. 

“Right now? Happier than I can ever remember being.” You say truthfully. 

“Awh. MAN.” She sniffles again. “Gosh, you’re such a loser! Gah, let’s go shopping before you make me - before another thing gets in my eye!” 

You grin like a wild woman the entire way through the parking lot. 


	35. In Which Things Get Really Personal In The Grocery Store

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this one took me much longer than expected, but, to be fair, I was very distracted by important youtube videos (and I had way way too much coffee today)  
> Thanks for being so patient, my children. I love you to the bottom of my fart. 
> 
> LAWYERPANTS CORNER FEAT: FANART
> 
> [ LOOK AT THIS ONE](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137271219891/i-have-like-30-other-things-to-do-but-i-had-to)

“So.” Undyne says, as the two of you prowl down the aisles. For just once, you’re going all out when it comes to food shopping; no looking at the unit prices, no immediately reaching for the store brand. You want to make one huge, perfect meal for your friends tomorrow (and a smaller, slightly less fancy one tonight), and you want it to just be fantastic, like… well, like you remember it used to be on Christmas. 

“So?” You arch an eyebrow. 

“So, what did you get your boyfriend for Christmas, did you figure that out? Cuz you nerds snuck off together and were gone all day, and since he barely lets you out of his sight, I can’t imagine you managed to shake him and buy something…” She says, grinning. You wince. 

“Uh. Well, I didn’t get him a thing, exactly.” You admit. She pauses, then gives you a very broad wink.

“Gonna give him the gift of _______, huh? How’s he gonna unwrap that one under the tree?” She teases. You groan - though, hell, the thought had crossed your mind a few times, and you had already caught yourself thinking more than once about the upcoming night… It had been one thing, when neither of you had known what to expect, but now that you knew that all it took was a few minutes and his tongue to break your constantly overthinking brain into pieces like one of those chocolate oranges… Oh, it’s warm in here. It’s very warm in here. Undyne is smirking at you, seeing that your mind has drifted somewhere interesting.

“That is literally not at all what I said.” You say, composing yourself and stopping at the cheese counter. “Man, how many fancy cheeses do you think we need?”

“Like… a thousand?” Undyne says, grinning eagerly. You roll your eyes, and grab way too many, anyway. God, it’s fun to shop, for once, without a budget. Hell, your bonus can allow this indulgence. “Well, so then, what are you giving him?” She pesters. 

“Nothing remotely sexy, god!” You laugh, seeing her eyebrow still raised. “You’ll just have to see when he opens it tomorrow!” 

“Aw.” She pouts. “You know, you _can_ give him something sexy too. Just saying. Just because you’ve got another gift, that doesn’t mean… Hey, can we get marshmallows and cook them in the fireplace tonight?!” Amazing. You were beginning to think that nothing could distract that mind when she’s focused on shipping, but apparently even Undyne has her weak spots. 

“Obviously we’re doing that.” You say with a giggle. “We’d better make cookies with Frisk and Paps as soon as we get back too, I don’t want them to miss that. What does um, wow, what does the King eat?” It suddenly occurs to you that you’re going to need to cater to a pretty large appetite, presumably, if Asgore does come. 

“Why so flustered? He’s a goober!” Undyne laughs. “Um, he likes snails, since Toriel likes snails. And butterscotch pie, since Toriel makes the hell out of that.”

“Oh, god, snails, I’d better go see if the seafood counter carries escargot…” You mutter. Undyne blinks. 

“Humans eat snails too?” She says, astonished. 

“Um, not frequently, around here anyway. Maybe in Paris. Good thing Mt. Ebott’s gotten so fancy from all this tourist money, a few years back this supermarket barely had fresh vegetables. Now, we might actually have a shot.” It’s true, Mt. Ebott’s always been a tourist destination, but this year, off-season just hadn’t happened, because the tourists weren’t coming for the sun and the beach anymore, they were coming to meet real live monsters and stare at the crater on the side of the mountain. At least the tourists were nice to monsters, more or less. They were just… tactless. Monsters weren’t like aquarium exhibits to be studied through glass, they were people!

The guy at the fish counter looks at the two of you, clearly startled, and you think to yourself that this guy seems like a prime example of someone who should learn tact, gaping at Undyne like that. Honestly, this is the biggest grocery store in town, he _must_ have interacted with monsters before. You stare back at him for a second, pointedly, and he clearly remembers himself.

“Afternoon, ladies! Sorry, I didn’t expect to see any celebrities on my shift!” He says, giving you a (frankly, adorable) smile. 

“What do you- Oh.” You duck your head, realizing that you’ve judged him wrong, and that he must recognize you from the news. Undyne snorts with laughter. 

“She’s not used to the attention yet.” She explains for you, grinning affectionately at you. “It’s been a big few days.” 

“Well, my boyfriend and I really, really appreciate you speaking up. I know it took a lot of guts.” He says, still beaming. He glances over his shoulder - you recognize that quick check to see if a manager is listening in, and warm to the cute redhead further. Luckily, you’re more or less on your own in this section of the store, so he feels free telling you, “My mom even called me yesterday. You know, she hadn’t, since I told her I was dating a monster. Being gay was one thing, but being with a monster…” He says, shaking his head. Undyne sighs, but then the young man brightens up. “But she said she saw you and Mettaton on the news, and she heard about what you were going through and she just felt awful. She said she realized that it must have been really rough on me, and that the heart wants what the heart wants, so she called and invited me and Aaron to dinner for Christmas!” He spills eagerly. 

“Oh, hey, you’re dating Aaron, that’s awesome!” Undyne says, genuinely delighted. “We’re gym buddies!”

“Isn’t he the best?” The guy - his name badge says Tommy - sighs. “So cute. And such a gentleman.” 

Undyne looks a little skeptical at this, and knowing that she’s not renowned for her tact, you speak up. 

“Well, wow! Geez, I can’t believe so many people watched me! I’m so glad that I helped to get through to your mom. That’s awesome.” You say, feeling a little reassured that your first real interaction with a non-Frisk human after the interview is going so smoothly. (You’re not counting Paula in the human category any longer, since you’re pretty sure humans need to be warm blooded, or at least in possession of a heart). He grins at you, then gasps.

“Oh, gosh, here I am talking, you’re probably in a rush. What can I get for you?” He says, looking a little ashamed. 

“Oh, it’s totally fine!” You assure him. “Honestly, that’s such wonderful news! But, uh, I was wondering… d’you have any escargot? I know, long shot….” He grins at you again. 

“Cooking for the queen, huh? We’ve been ordering it in special for her. How much you need?” 

“How much does she usually get?” You say, feeling relieved. He tells you. You whistle softly. That’s a lot of snails. “Okay. Uh, let’s be safe and triple that.”

“Heh. Think we might have just enough. You think the queen’s gonna be hungry?” He laughs. You shrug.

“Uh, the King of all monsters is coming to my house today too.” You say, and it’s his turn to let out a quiet whistle. Undyne rolls her eyes. 

“Humans. So impressed with the title. It’s just Asgore, no biggie. He’s such a nice guy!” She says dismissively. 

“We’re just not used to dealing with royalty. And Asgore is… impressive!” You laugh. 

“He’s a stud.” Tommy sighs dreamily, then grins when Undyne snickers. “Okay, I’ll be right back.” Undyne grins, and then looks at the fish intently, picking out the ones she wants. 

“I’m cooking dinner for everyone tonight. In the underground, we always ate fish on Christmas Eve, it’s a tradition.” She insists, and you chuckle, suspecting that she’s also angling to make sure she gets to eat her favorite food tonight. 

“Sure thing. Maybe one of the things we, er, you cook, could be a puttanesca or something? You know, that spaghetti dish that has anchovies in the sauce? I want Papyrus to feel included.” You say, and she beams. 

“Great idea.” Just then, Tommy returns with a large, heavy package of escargot wrapped in brown butcher’s paper. 

“Anything else, ladies?” Undyne grins hungrily, and Tommy swallows. 

Twelve more paper packages later, Undyne looks satisfied, Tommy looks a little intimidated, and you’re feeling more than a little relieved when Undyne turns to you and says, “Don’t worry. The fish is on me and Alphys.” She sees your brow furrow. “What’s the matter, dude?”

“I want to make an innuendo about the fish being on Alphys.” You whisper. “I want that so bad, you have no idea. And I just… can’t make it work.” You hiss, frustrated. Undyne tips back her head and roars with laughter.

“You can’t one-up the master just yet, nerd.” She says, transferring the packages into your cart. 

“Anything else?” Tommy says cheerfully. 

“Nah. Except, yo, idea! I haven’t seen your boyfriend since I switched to the university’s gym, I miss him! If you and Aaron want to come to our New Years Eve party at __________’s mansion, have Aaron text me okay? Name’s Undyne, he’ll know how to reach me.” She says, still grinning. Tommy looks surprised, then immensely pleased. 

“Wow! Sure! Oh, and I’m, um, Tommy. Well, you guys can read, I’m sure you noticed.” He says, adorably awkward as he glances down at his nametag. “Oh, that’s so nice of you, Aaron will be psyched! Oh man, all my friends are gonna flip! See ya, you guys!” He waves at you, and you wave back. 

“Thanks again!” 

Once you’re out of eyesight, you tilt your head at Undyne.

“New Years Eve party?” You say. Undyne snickers. 

“Oh, were you not going to have one?” She teases. “You really didn’t already start planning ringing in the New Year with your new friends and your new man?”

“Oh, shhh.” You scold, laughing. It’s a little presumptuous, sure, but the more you think about it, the wider your smile grows. “I haven’t had a party in ages, I mean, other than anime with you guys.” You admit with a shrug. “I think my last one had a clown and a pony. This could be fun. Oh, wow, I’ve never had a New Year’s kiss before! This is actually kind of exciting!”

“Knew it. And you’ll get to meet some more of our friends, and make some new ones. Like that human! It’s good for you to have human friends too, you know.” She says, matter of factly. 

“That’s true, I suppose.” You muse. “He did seem like a sweetheart.”

“And imagine the look on Sans’ face when a cute human boy appears on your doorstep.” Undyne purrs. You cross your arms, looking at her. 

“You’re obsessed.” You sigh. “You’re obsessed with drama.” She shrugs, not even the tiniest hint of guilt on her face. 

“Don’t you think it’s hot when he’s a little possessive?” She inquires lightly. You clear your throat, glancing pointedly at the paper towel display behind her. Did you need paper towels? “Yup.” Undyne laughs. “Figured. You didn’t even bother to cover up that hickie this morning.” You think about this for a second, then your eyes go very wide and you slap your hand to your neck.

“OH NO. I FORGOT.” You exclaim, mortified. “Oh my god, Lawyerpants saw… oh, oh no, Toriel did too. AND FRISK! Oh jeez, I’m gonna kill that bonehead, I knew he was smiling about something all morning, oh gosh…”

“Hey, hey.” Undyne calms you. “It’s not as bad as it was yesterday. It’s easier to miss. And besides... you had fun getting it, right?”

“Of course I did, but… aw jeez. There’s not any new ones, are there?” You park yourself in the aisle, craning your neck each way so she can reassure you.

“None that I can see.” She says with a smirk. “Doesn’t mean there aren’t any more, I suppose, but they’re not obvious.” 

“Oh my god.” You sigh, shaking your head. “Okay, okay. Let’s finish up, but we need to stop at the makeup section on the way out. I’m not leaving without concealer.”

\--------------------------------------

It turns out, however, that even after you pick up the turkey and stuffing and rolls (and stuffed shells ingredients, and brussel sprouts, and a thousand other things that you both agree that you urgently need to have the best Christmas ever), even after the concealer, you have one more potential purchase, which you think of as you glance past the shampoo in the aisle and something catches your eye. 

“Oh, gosh.” You mutter. 

“What’s the matter?” Undyne says.

“Um... “ You nod at the display. Her brow furrows in confusion. 

“What’s a… con-dom?” She pronounces, walking over and picking up a box.

Oh no. 

“That’s not a thing monsters have?” You ask quickly. She shakes her head, flipping the box over. 

“Uh, nope. What is it? Is it some sort of... “ She squints at the package. “I am… confused.” She mutters after a moment. 

You grimace. 

“Okay.” You say very quietly. “Um, how do monsters have babies?” She flushes slightly. 

“Depends on the type of monster.” She says, looking at her feet. 

“In general, then.” You try. 

“Um… when two monsters love each other very much, and they decide to bring a precious young one into the world, they both exchange their, um, magic, and a tiny part of their soul, and a new soul grows from that, obviously, but it depends on if like, you lay eggs or if you’re warm blooded, or…” She trails off, grinning and blushing. 

“But like, during sex, right?” You ask, very, very quietly, and she snorts. 

“Uh, yeah, well, usually. I suppose technically you don’t have to have sex. Moldsmals don’t. Well, they don’t need another partner either, I suppose. But, in general… You have to be close enough to the other person to understand their soul enough to even begin to combine it with yours, I guess, and it’s the most fun, romantic way to to the magic exchange, in my opinion, but - I don’t know, I’ve never done it!” She stammers, then raises an eyebrow. “Why, how does it work with humans?”

You glance around to make sure, once again, that nobody’s even close to overhearing you, then tell her. She stares at you, wide eyed, for a long time, then yelps and drops the pack of condoms like it burned her. 

“Bleah! WHY?!” She stammers, horrified. You shake your head. 

“We don’t have magic, Undyne, we gotta make do with cells and stuff.”

“But, so like, anyone could just make a baby with _anyone?_ By _accident_ , even?!!” She says, shaking her head. 

“Uh, yep.” You say. “That’s why there’s condoms.” You bend over and scoop up the package she’d dropped on the ground, feeling easily as embarrassed as Undyne. “So… you don’t think I’d need them, with Sans, if we-”

“Aw, jeez, dude. Better safe than sorry, get some! How many do you need?! Are they reusable?!”

“GAH, NO!” You laugh, horrified, then look at the packages. “I suppose I should, just to be safe. I’ve never actually bought them before, I don’t know…” You both stare at the wall of options, a little intimidated. 

“They’re kinda arranged by size.” Undyne finally notes. Now that she’s gotten over her shock, it’s clear that she’s on the verge of giggles. “Do you know what size-”

“Uh, _BIG_.” You say immediately, without thinking, then make a quiet, desperate sort of scream into the hand you immediately slap against your mouth, as Undyne begins to snicker, her eyes wide.

“I am so happy we’re friends.” She finally mutters. 

“This has been the most uncomfortable shopping trip of my entire life.” You reply, grabbing a box for the ‘well endowed gentleman” quickly and putting it in the cart. She grins at you very widely, obviously waiting, until you sigh and say, 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m happy we’re friends too. Actually… thank god.” You admit, shaking your head. You’re not sure how you would have attempted to negotiate that purchase without her. You’ve still got some questions, and you’re pretty sure you’re buying something totally unnecessary, but she’s set your mind at ease, having a little better idea how this will work. 

Then again, you suddenly recall, Sans isn’t exactly a monster, Sans is an eldritch being from beyond the realm of human comprehension, so maybe the same rules don’t apply, so….

Shaking your head again, you reach out and grab another pack. 

Just in case. 

\-----------------------------------------

The trip home is uneventful, but you’re thrilled, upon your return, to be greeted with the smell of cookies baking, the sound of Christmas music in the air - oh, good, they’d figured out how to use your ancient iPod, hooked up to the formerly state of the art speaker system. Frisk and Toriel have beaten you back here, and Toriel wants to know where they should put their things. 

“I TOLD THEM, I HAVE MANY, MANY ROOMS THAT THEY MAY CHOOSE FROM, BUT THEY INSISTED ON WAITING!” Papyrus grumbles. 

“We just wanted to make sure we would be somewhere convenient.” Toriel says apologetically, smiling as Sans hops down from his seat on a barstool (where he’s been reading your Bio textbook from night school) to walk over and wrap his arm around you in wordless greeting, lips grazing your neck for a split second. That second is long enough to make you forget that you’d ever been mad at him for the bruise he’d left the other day, and it’s suddenly hard to remember what Toriel was asking. 

Oh, right. Where do you put a queen? A queen who’s already determined she’s your adoptive aunt? 

You take a deep breath, then release it. “Follow me, you two. I know where you should stay.” You say with a small smile.

It’s been ages since you’ve been up on the third floor. You just haven’t had a reason, except for the occasional nostalgic moment, where you go through your mom and dad’s photo albums and sit on their big bed and remember what it was like to be small and safe. Fortunately, it hasn’t gotten too terribly dusty up here - your parent’s will had that trust set aside for house maintenance, so a few times a year, the lawyer charged with maintaining the trust would hire a cleaning service to clean and inspect the house from top to bottom. Thank goodness he had, because that meant, when you opened the door to the master bedroom for Toriel, that you knew there were fresh linens on the bed, that all the lights worked still, that the bathroom was stocked with everything she’d need, and that the windows weren’t embarrassingly smudged or dingy. 

“Oh, _____________!” Toriel gasps, walking in. “Oh, my, this is lovely!” You grin shyly. 

“Uh, thanks. It used to be my mom and dad’s.” You say. “Since we’re kinda like family now-”

“We most certainly are family, my niece!” She says firmly. You grin at her. 

“Anyway, it’s got a great view.” The windows up here are floor to ceiling, all along one wall, facing the back yard and the bay, and, to the right, the breathtaking scale of the volcanic mount.” Frisk’s eyes are wide as they walk right over to the window, pressing their nose against the glass and looking out. You giggle and walk over next to them, doing the same thing. Frisk whips out a little tablet computer from their pocket, and a minute later, a child’s robotic voice says,

“It’s so pretty! There’s so much water!” 

“And sky, dear one.” Toriel says wistfully. You smile at the both of them. 

“Alright Frisk, want to go see your room? It’s right next door.” Frisk nods happily, and reaches up to take your hand. You grin, and walk your little cousin into your old room. You’d barely been ten when you’d lost your parents, and Paula had told you that you weren’t a little girl, that you should move out of a little kid’s room, and you’d believed her, and picked the blandest, most adult room to stay in after that. In retrospect, Paula must have thought that being so close to your parents’ room was making your nightmares worse, and she might even have been right about that, but…

Frisk’s eyes go wide and round when they see their room. Your parents had gone all out, of course. There’s the same amazing floor to ceiling view as the master bedroom, but the walls are painted in different environments; a rainforest on one wall, the deep sea on another, a polar bear perched on an iceberg on the third. The center of the room is filled with a big, fake tree trunk that stretches from the floor to the ceiling as well; branches (complete with leaves) and planks form a climbable spiral staircase up the trunk, and there’s a slide from the top that sends you gliding right into the twin sized bed, tucked into the wall. There’s more in the tree, of course: there’s a door in the base that you can climb inside to curl up on a beanbag chair and read in privacy, or a hammock hanging from one of the medium height branches. 

Oh, and there’s books and stuffed animals and toys and puzzles, and a whole closet stuffed with clothes, and a little guitar and a keyboard off in one corner, and twinkle lights on the roof. It had been the most incredible room any little kid had ever been given, you realize now. God, your parents had loved you so, so much. 

“I hope you like it, kiddo.” You say with a crooked smile. “This is your room from now on, okay? Whenever you and Toriel want to visit, you’ve got a room just for you, okay? You too, Toriel.”

Frisk takes a moment, then begins hopping up and down, an enormous smile on their face. Toriel places her hand over her heart, watching Frisk’s absolute glee with an adoring, loving smile on her face. Finally Frisk calms down enough to type “THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THIS IS THE MOST AMAZING ROOM I’VE EVER SEEN!” They hug you tight around the waist, and you smile, your heart almost hurting with how happy you are.

“I’m so glad you like it, kiddo.” You whisper. “I love you, bud.”

“I love you too, cousin!” Frisk types and the voice chirps - it’s a very good robotic voice, no doubt thanks to Alphys

“To think that we would not have this wonderful gift of family, if that vile woman hadn’t threatened my baby today.” Toriel says, in mild disbelief, and takes the opportunity to hug you once more. You beam, letting your cheek rest against the soft fur of her ear for a moment. “You are so generous, my niece.” She murmurs. 

“I mean it, Toriel. This is yours now, okay, both of you, whenever you want to stay? I want a relationship with my cousin, and with my new… oh, wow, it’s so strange to think I have an aunt I don’t hate!” You giggle. Toriel smiles so warmly at you, you can barely believe it. “Oh, just… man, I’m so sorry, just one thing.” You say quickly, feeling suddenly guilty. 

“What is it, my niece?” She asks, all concern. 

“Uh, the only other bedroom on this floor is…. the only one with a king sized bed. And, since we’ve got a king coming?” You say sheepishly. “Is it too weird if he stays up on this floor with you guys?” 

“Oh! Er, certainly, of course!” Toriel says, blushing prettily. “Oh, goodness, of course he can.” She adds, a bit more firmly. 

Behind her, Frisk smiles even wider. You might not know sign, but you know what two thumbs up means from your eight year old cousin.


	36. In Which Sans Gets Called Out For His Internet Research

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi kiddos
> 
> There's now an official Lawyerpants spinoff. 
> 
> What a world we live in. 
> 
> [Customer Service](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5732245/chapters/13209118#bookmark-form) by [Mimispace](http://thehoneybeewitch.tumblr.com/)

You leave Toriel and Frisk to get settled in, once Toriel confirms that Asgore was delighted to be invited to stay with you for the holiday. 

“Oh, my dear niece, he said he would come over within the next few hours.” She says, halfway between excitement and worry. “You’re certain you don’t mind having him-”

“Of course, Toriel.” You say, quite firmly. If there’s anything lingering between her and the king, well, Frisk certainly supports it, and Frisk seems to know what’s up. Toriel’s smiling though, hearing the way you say her name.

“You could also call me… Tori, if you wished.” She says shyly. “Or even Aunt Tori.” You grin, thinking about it. 

“I think that sounds wonderful.” You agree. “Gosh, that has a much nicer ring than ‘Aunt Paula,’ don’t you agree?” Toriel lets out a guilty, tinkling laugh and nods. 

Frisk’s fingers move in a blur across the tablet. 

“‘Tori’ is what Dad still calls Mom.” They inform you with a grin. Toriel rolls her eyes at her child. 

“As does Sans, and many of my other dear friends as well, you little sassafras.” She says with a soft chuckle. Frisk beams at her, then looks around the room.

“Does Papyrus know this is up here?” They ask, and you bite your lip. 

“Gosh, he must not. I didn’t even think to show him, and I think Sans told him to keep this floor off limits…” You murmur, then grin. “You wanna show him? He’s gonna be a little jealous…” You warn, still smiling. Frisk hops up and down twice, jumps up with clear practice to kiss Toriel’s cheek, and is about to tear off before they remember you. They squeeze you again around the waist, and giggle when you lean down to peck a kiss on the crown of their head. Then Frisk is off, tearing out the door and down the stairs. Damn, the kid is fast!

Toriel gazes after Frisk for a moment, smiling, then places a heavy paw on your shoulder. “You’ve made your little cousin very happy today.” She murmurs. “And, goodness, your new aunt as well! I was beginning to get a bit concerned, Frisk has been… reluctant to make human friends since we returned to the surface.” She sighs, then smiles. “Then again, they took to you almost immediately... and that was before either of you knew, so maybe this was all, somehow ... fate?” She whispers. You smile crookedly at her. 

“I’m not a big fate person.” You admit. “But… yeah, the thought keeps occurring to me recently.” Toriel smiles gently to herself, and nods with satisfaction. Then, suddenly, she gasps. 

“Oh, dear, Asgore will be arriving any minute now, and I’m still wearing this dusty old thing!” She sighs, pulling at the front of her lovely velvet robe. You chuckle. 

“Tori, you look beautiful!” You insist, but she shakes her head. 

“No, no, but I need to look… magnificent. Commanding.” She pronounces. “I have to make the correct impression.” You grin, wondering what’s going on in her head. Surely she’s not considering picking the mantel of queen back up again for good, is she?

The determination in her eyes suggests that perhaps she is. 

“Well, would you like to get unpacked and changed, and I’ll call you and Frisk and Paps down when the king arrives?” You suggest. She nods thankfully. 

“That would be wonderful, thank you, dear niece.” She says, already bustling out of Frisk’s room and back into the master bedroom. You smile after her, and then, whistling slightly to yourself, head down the stairs, grinning when Papyrus and Frisk blow past you, racing on the way up. 

“All done with cooking, Paps?” You check. Papyrus sighs and screeches to a stop, arching an eyebrow ridge. 

“THERE IS NO NEED TO FRET, HUMAN, I HAVE MADE THE PASTA AND THE COOKIES AND THE PASTA COOKIES.” 

Pasta cookies. You artfully hide a wince, then smile. “Okay, bud, just checking.”

“THE GREAT PAPYRUS NEVER LEAVES A JOB HALF DONE!” He assures you, picking up Frisk and placing them on his shoulders as he speaks, like Frisk weighs no more than a feather. Frisk grins, and points Papyrus up the stairs like Napoleon on horseback, and Papyrus takes off again, taking the steps two at a time. 

Thinking about Toriel’s logic, then looking down at your casual t-shirt, flannel and jeans, you wonder if you might not want to dress up a little nicer for tonight yourself. It certainly wouldn’t hurt to look cute, right? With that logic in your mind, you turn on the second story landing and head to your room.

You push the door open with your knee, simultaneously pulling your flannel off, and are met with a low laugh. You jump slightly, your heart in your throat, then glare when you realize it’s just Sans. 

“don’t stop on my account.” He insists sweetly, perched on the edge of your bed, a broad smile on his face. You let out a quiet laugh, shaking your head. 

“You almost gave me a heart attack!” You say, closing the door behind you and walking over to stand in front of him. “Jeez! What are you doing just sitting in here by yourself, bonehead?” He tilts his skull innocently. You rather like the mischievous look in his eyes at the moment. 

“you, uh, left some groceries on the table i figured you wanted up here?” He says, flashing you a very wide grin. With the absence of any amount of tact, he picks up one of the boxes between his thumb and pointer finger, letting it dangle as he raises both eyebrows.

You blink, then immediately realize your mistake. “Oh. OH. Haha, whoops?” You say quite sheepishly, feeling your face heat up. “Eep, wait, I left that in the kitchen with the food? And, god, with your brother? Oh no…”

“oh... yes.” He grins even wider, then relents when he sees genuine distress on your face at the thought of Papyrus witnessing this discovery. “don’t worry, babe.” He murmurs, examining the label again. “i got to it before papyrus saw anything.” He waits, a perfect comedic beat, then adds, “which is for the best, because paps would have definitely wondered what a, uh, ‘well endowed gentleman’ was.” He says, his voice shaking just a little with the effort to hold in his laughter. He looks absurdly pleased with himself at the moment. Oh, that confident little shit. You just couldn’t decide if you loved it when he was like this, or if it drove you crazy. Maybe both. You couldn’t just let him grin at you like that, though, because god, you hated losing.

“You sure this is what you want to tease me about, Sans?” You ask lightly, forcing casualness into your tone. He freezes, his smile dropping, and now you’re rather enjoying the suddenly worried look on his face. “Are you _absolutely certain_ that these are the jokes you want to make right now?” Sans blinks, suddenly considering this. 

“uh, i suppose...” He begins. “maybe….” He trails off, swallowing audibly, as you move to sit, cautiously, on his lap. You needn’t be so careful. He said before that he manifests his body as necessary, and right now, his legs are more than just bone, they’re supporting you without you needing to do any difficult balancing. Ghost lap, you supposed. Oh, your boyfriend was weird. You loved it. You settle in more comfortably, a smile on your face. 

“There. Wasn’t so hard to be nice, was it?” You murmur, and lean against him to kiss him slowly. He groans softly against your lips, wrapping his arms around your waist. 

“define _so hard_.” He murmurs, sounding a little frustrated, and you grin slowly, feeling much better about the circumstances when he no longer has the obvious upper hand. Maybe another situation is growing increasingly more obvious, but it certainly isn’t anything involving a hand.

“Aw, baby, is that all it takes?” You whisper with a grin, curious, brushing your lips against his jawbone. You know that you don’t really have time for this, but, hell, if he’s gonna tease you, then you’re gonna be a tease right back in return. He sighs quietly, then chuckles.

“well, uh, i…” He begins, then grins. “oh man. let’s just say I was pretty happy to see those in the bottom of the grocery bag.” He admits. “and maybe i’ve got, um, an active imagination. and, maybe i’ve been sitting here for a while, waiting for you to show up. plenty of time to imagine stuff.” He says, giving you a toothy grin that starts a spark of excitement somewhere in your chest. “though, uh…. i mean, as long as you’re cool with it, the condoms are not, uh, strictly necessary?” He suggests after a second’s thought. You mull this over, feeling mildly pleased by this revelation. Then, something occurs to you. Undyne didn’t even know what a condom was, but Sans apparently could recognize the boxes by sight, and clearly knew whether or not they were necessary, which meant… 

“You’ve been doing some research.” You murmur, giving him a grin. He flushes again, nodding. 

“uh, babe, i hadn’t exactly been dating people before you. i’ve been doing nothing _but_ research.” He breathes, and you lose control and giggle, grinning at the pout on his face. 

“Poor baby.” You murmur playfully. “Lots of, um, computer research, then?” You tease, just a little, and he groans, immediately understanding what you’re driving at (and simultaneously confirming your suspicions). 

“you’re mean.” He accuses, leaning forward to kiss you again.

“Poor Sans.” You repeat with a grin, and rest your forearms lazily on his shoulders, looping your arms around his neck and kissing him in return. You stay there for a while, feeling content, until he groans softly, suddenly holding you quite tightly. When he pulls away, he surprises you by no longer smiling; rather, he’s studying you very seriously. The lights in his eyes are bright and intense.

“Sans?” You murmur, the playful tone dropping from your voice as you look at him.

“sometimes i can’t believe you’re real.” He says, his voice deep and quiet and serious, and you shiver involuntarily. “i can’t believe you’re here with me. i can’t believe you want to be here with me.” He whispers roughly, and you shake your head, understanding that the mood has shifted, if not, entirely, why. On a certain level, you don’t care. You just want him to be happy. You want him to be okay.

“‘Course I do, Sans.” You murmur, curling up a little and leaning your head against his ribcage, your arms slipping around his body. “Of course I want to be with you. I lo-” 

Suddenly, you stop talking, nearly gasping as you realize how close that forbidden word was to having slipped from your lips. He’s studying you much too intently to let that slide by, of course. You could practically feel every molecule of him come to attention as he hears the first syllable of something that he’s clearly been waiting for. He looks down at you urgently, a nearly desperate expression on his face. 

“____________.” He whispers. “please.” His voice is rough, nearly tumultuous as he fixes those pinprick eyes on you. 

“Sans, I…” You reply quietly, trying to find the right words, feeling absolutely panicked. You’re not ready, god, it’s all too fast, and if you love him, if you say that out loud and make it real and then he leaves, you’ll fall apart. 

“please?” He repeats, sounding almost hopeless. 

And you’re certain, all of a sudden, that yes, you do love him, because you’d do anything, anything on earth to mean that he didn’t sound like that. It doesn’t mean, however, that you’re any less scared to express it; no, now it’s worse, because you know for sure, you know for a firm solid fact like two plus two or the color of the sky that you love him, and concrete things can be hurt, concrete things can be broken. 

“I just met you.” You rationalize out loud. “I just met you, so it would be stupid, it would be wrong, this is what stupid wrong people do, I can’t do that, I can’t be that idiot, I can’t let myself get hurt-” That little screaming voice in your head has finally been let out to play, and it’s saying all those calculated things, all the things you’re sure will make him leave once he realizes they’re true.

“it’s not stupid, it’s not wrong.” He’s insisting, talking over you. “it’s the only thing that’s right on this entire planet.” He’s lost control of his emotions, and he’s crackling with magic, and you’re breathing hard, trying not to be swamped by that giddy wild feeling, that ... fuck, that sensation of undeniable love. “don’t give a shit, i’ll say it, i love you, ___________, i love you already, i know it’s fast but i _know your soul_ and i love you,” He says, each word causing another firework of delighted helplessness to go off in your chest, and you don’t know what to do.

“It’s stupid.” You whisper.

“i love you.”

“ _I’m_ stupid.”

“i love every single thing about you.”

“You can’t know-”

“i’ve touched your soul, i _know._ ” He breathes, and there’s hope back in his eyes. “please.” 

You’re out of arguments. Still, you struggle. You fall silent, and so does he, and time creaks by, a minute, two, and the hope is nearly gone now, and once it’s gone, you don’t know what will come next. 

You’re not cruel enough to find out. Worse, part of you wants him to know. Part of you is desperate for someone to know about this thing that’s been forming in your soul, growing stronger and more real every time you look at him or hear him or touch him. 

“...I love you.” You whisper roughly, waiting for something to happen, the void to open, a lightning bolt to strike you down. 

It doesn’t happen. You take a deep breath, and reach up, tracing his cheekbone with your fingers. “I do. Fuck, I really do.” You whisper, more or less to yourself, and thus consigned, lean up to kiss him once more, a sensation like what relief would be if it was magnified a thousand times surging through your core, and he threads his fingerbones into your hair and holds you tight, and there you are, in love with a skeleton who loves you back, and all the things that aren’t kissing him are slowly fading to the background of your mind, and it’s not like you feared, there’s nothing wrong at all, and something that feels happier than ‘happy’ has ever felt is coiling through you, touching each molecule, leaking into the space between molecules, and you love him, and he loves you, and-

“SANTA, SANTA, THEY’RE PROBABLY HIDING IN HERE!” Papyrus’ voice bursts your blissful bubble, and you have just enough time to quickly straighten up so you’re _almost_ in a respectable pose - well you’re still on his lap - when the door slowly swings open, and a deep voice goes,

“Ho ho h….oh, boy.” Asgore, dressed up from head to toe in an immaculate Santa costume, is standing in your doorway, looking tremendously apologetic. Sans (sounding rather far away from you due to the sound of blood rushing in your ears at this, the greatest embarrassment of all time) glances at Asgore, then Papyrus, then you, clearing his throat. 

“uh… heyyyyy, santa.” He says helplessly. Papyrus begins to giggle.

This is his finest work as a barrier to date.


	37. In Which Mettaton Is Background Upset That Your Silverware Collection Isn't As Extensive As He Deems Necessary

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NO KILLER ALL FILLER  
> (I should stop sassing my chapters)  
> Enjoy the fluff, stop telling me about bees. 
> 
> [Customer Service](http://www.totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com</a>TRUMBLR</a>%0A%0AAlso%20make%20sure%20you%20read%20<a%20href=) cuz it is the official Lawyerpants spinoff.

“Uh.. ho ho ho!” Asgore recovers, glancing at Papyrus. “Oookay, Papyrus, let’s see who else we can spread Christmas cheer to, huh?”

“BUT SANTA, THEY DON’T LOOK CHEERFUL-”

“Oh, I think that Mettaton probably needs a visit more!” Asgore manages, looking very apologetic. “Didn’t you say that he was down in the dumps, child?”

“WELL… METTATON IS VERY SAD THAT LAWYERPANTS DOESN’T THINK HE’S SEXY…” Papyus muses. “FINE, YOU’RE RIGHT. OF COURSE YOU’RE RIGHT! YOU’RE SANTA!” He grins. “BYE BROTHER! BYE ________! FEEL BETTER!” He encourages, then goes stomping down the hall to find Mettaton. Asgore eyes the both of you, winces, and very slowly closes the door, until it fastens with a definite click. 

The silence is deafening. 

“Did that just-”

“yup.” The two of you stare, frozen in shock at the door. Very very slowly, you stand up, climbing off of him, and then collapse onto a seat next to him, slumping. 

“babe.” Sans sighs.

“Uh, yeah?” You mutter, and when he doesn’t readily reply, you turn to look at him, the feeling in the pit of your stomach growing, deepening when you see the mortified look on his face, his refusal to meet your eyes as he gazes at the door. How about that, you muse, feeling exhausted, you were right. One little ripple, and he’s about to say that he doesn’t love you, that he made a mistake, that he’s humiliated to have been seen by his boss with you and everything’s-

“we _need_ to get a lock.” He mutters, still staring at the door. 

You can’t help it.

Succumbing to the relief, you begin shaking with laughter, trying to hold it in and quivering. “oh god, don’t cry, i’m so sorry-” He whispers, and you just give up, you lose it, laughing so hard, your hands covering your face, that you just can’t stop. You can tell, without looking, that he’s staring at you like you’re the strangest person on earth, and you’re trying to recover enough to apologize when he begins to laugh too.

“Oh god,” You finally gasp, leaning against him. “Oh, god, his face…”’

“why does _nobody_ know how to knock?!” He gasps, practically hysterical. 

“Do you know? Do you - ahahah, do you even realize how many people have walked into my room since the day you texted me??” You say desperately, trying to catch your breath.

“almost everyone i know!” He wheezes, shaking his head. “we’re getting a lock!”

“The King! Your boss! Dressed as SANTA! We’re getting a lock!” You confirm, and grin at him, wiping the tears from your eyes. “Oh, god, I’m so sorry, I can’t stop-” 

It takes you a long time for both of you to feel like you’re completely free of random fits of laughter. Even then, his first few attempts to speak are worthless.

“________, god, i-” He tries, and gives up when you begin laughing again, picturing the king’s horrified face. The King of All Monsters, dressed up as Santa, had busted in on you in the most important, most intimate moment of your life. Him and an enthusiastic, athletic, absolutely delighted skeleton. “oh, god, i love you.” He finally manages, still shaking with laughter, and without even thinking, you lean in to kiss him as sweetly as you know how, still occasionally shaking with the stray laugh. 

“I love you too.” You finally whisper.

\-----------------------------

You eventually reach an agreement. Sans is leaving first, you’re going to wrap your Christmas presents up here, then you’ll join, and hopefully the hilarity will be entirely over by then, or, better still, Asgore will no longer be dressed as Santa, because if he asks you to sit on his lap, you’re going to lose your goddamn mind. 

“Be good.” You warn him, kissing him once more before he stands up. 

“i always am.” He says, then winks at you, ducking out the door, before you can scold him that NO HE ISN’T. You groan, your stomach hurting from all that laughing, and pull your presents out from under the bed, grabbing some wrapping paper from the closet. You decide to wrap Undyne’s first, and are satisfied with that decision, when, not two minutes after finishing, you hear a pointed knock on the door. 

“Yes?” You call. 

“Uh, Sans told me to knock?” Undyne says, sounding skeptical. “Ummm…. should I come back?” You begin laughing again (ouch), and call, 

“Come in, dork.” She opens the door tentatively, and chuckles when she sees the wrapped package in front of you. 

“Oh, is that all!? He was being really vague about why to knock.” 

“Heh, well, he would. Want to help me wrap?” You offer. 

“Sure!” She flops down on the ground next to you, and grabs a multipack of action figures for Papyrus, launching into wrapping it with her characteristic enthusiasm. “So, what does that mean, ‘he would?’” She asks, pulling off what you privately think is an excessive amount of tape. You wince, then, with some trepidation, tell her. Her eyes go wide. 

“C’mon.” You sigh. “C’mon, it’s not that bad, is it?” You’re beginning to feel awkward. She clears her throat. 

“Uhhhh… what if I told you that, um, someone I know… had confessed that specific fantasy to me?” She whispers. You blink. 

“What, with Sans?” You try. She shoves your shoulder hard. 

“NO, DORK. WITH, UH… well, it doesn’t matter!” You narrow your eyes. 

“...Dude, are you talking about Alphys?” 

“I NEVER SAID THAT!” Undyne bellows, and narrows her eyes as you begin to snicker. 

“Sorry! Sorry, Undyne, just, it was actually the worst!” You cry. She groans, and slaps a Christmas bow square on the top of your head. “Hey, what was that for?” 

“You’re an innocent baby angel who deserves it.” She grumbles. You grin. 

You also keep the bow right where it is.

\-----------------------------

When it comes time to haul all the Christmas presents downstairs and put them under the tree, you’re already smelling amazing things that must be coming from the kitchen. 

“Jeez, Undyne, what did you do?” You ask, juggling your packages. She grins. 

“I just started cooking.” She admits. “All of a sudden, everyone wanted to chip in. I feel like tomorrow’s dinner is in danger of being showed up.” 

Once you get downstairs, you have to admit that she’s probably right. Bringing your presents into the TV room where the Christmas tree is, you notice that the long banquette table has been dragged back in, and that it’s absolutely covered with appetizers and snacks already. 

“There you are, darling! Nice bow!” Mettaton swoops over, taking half of your armful of presents and depositing them artfully under the tree. You giggle, happy to see that he’s in higher spirits, and distribute the rest. There’s more presents under this tree than you’ve ever seen, including quite a few from “Santa” that you were certainly not expecting. Frisk and Papyrus were going to have a good year this year. You stand back, smiling at the display, and then grin when Mettaton presses a glass of champagne into your hand. 

“Thanks, Mettaton.” You say happily, and lean over to kiss his cheek. He beams, and then bustles into the next room to announce that you’re downstairs. Undyne’s hanging back by the tray of escargot, grinning. 

“Sans would have blown a gasket if he saw that.” She comments. You arch an eyebrow. 

“I think he’s actually over being jealous of Mettaton.” You say, strolling over to look at the display of food.

She gives you a look, and shrugs, strolling towards the kitchen. You’re just about to follow her when you hear heavy feet on the floor. 

“Oh, there you are, child!” Toriel comes bustling over, in an absolutely lovely purple dress. “Did you know that Asgore is here?” You clear your throat. 

“Uh. Yep!” You say brightly, and, in order to change the subject, quickly grab an escargot, swimming with garlic, herbs and butter, from the dish. Toriel’s eyes widen. 

“FRISK!” She calls, and you hesitate. A few seconds later, the pitter patter of Frisk’s small feet echoes on the hardwood of the floors. They emerge into the TV room, pulling Asgore’s hand. You immediately flush, but realize just as quickly that you can’t acknowledge that you’ve seen him, not without revealing that he’s Santa. 

“Hey little cuz! Hi, Asgore, welcome!” You say, giving a too wide smile. Asgore nods graciously, the slightest twinkle in his eye. 

“Frisk, look, child, humans do eat snails!” Toriel is saying excitedly. You wince. It’s been a long, long time - but you remember being around Frisk’s age in Paris and your parents doing the same routine. 

“We sure do. Wanna give it a try, squirt?” Frisk gives first you, then Toriel a skeptical look, then carefully walks over. “Don’t worry, buddy.” You tell your cousin, when they stand next to you and eye the plate. “It’s actually pretty good. Here, grab one!” Frisk does, very tentatively. “Sorry, pal, we don’t have all the tools to eat them like you’re supposed to, I think there’s supposed to be tongs or something-”

“Well, that’s just silly, we eat them with our hands in the underground!” Toriel sniffs. 

“Ah, but we aren’t in the underground, Tori.” Asgore says gently. Toriel looks at him, perhaps prepared to complain, then sighs and shuts her mouth. 

“Oh, I suppose you’re right.” 

“On rare occasion.” They smile at each other, and you’re just beginning to wonder if you should leave, when Toriel whips out her cellphone. 

“Go on, Frisk!” She urges. You grin, and nod next to the plate of snails, where Mettaton has placed several tiny, two-tonged forks. 

“Grab one of those, bud.” Frisk does so. “Okay. Want to try it at the same time?” You urge. Frisk hesitates, then nods eagerly. “Okay. You chicken out, you’re a total monkey butt.” Frisk’s eyes narrow. They’re not having that. “Ready? One… two... three!” You spear the snail with your fork, pulling it from the shell, and put it in your mouth before you can regret it. It’s… 

Well, it’s actually really tasty. You swallow, then look at the shell with astonishment. 

“Who made that?” You ask, trying not to show your surprise. 

“Me, darling!” Mettaton calls, ducking out from the doorjamb he’d clearly been hidden behind to receive his acclaim. You grin at him. 

“Great job, Mettaton, they’re even tastier than I remember!” 

“Oh, it was nothing, darling, I did study for a month at the Cordon Bleu school and…” He trails off, looking at the King and Queen. Toriel is still filming, but Asgore has moved closer, watching through the viewfinder with a broad grin on his face. Frisk isn’t paying attention to anyone. They’re eating another snail without hesitating, then another. 

“Tori. Look at our child.” Asgore murmurs. 

“Y-yes. They’re quite something, aren’t they?” Toriel whispers, and you can hear the emotion in her voice. 

“It’s not too much?” Asgore whispers. “Are you okay?” The queen dabs at her eyes with the fur of her wrist. 

“No. It’s not too much. Frisk is… oh, the most wonderful child.” 

“Tied for the most.” Asgore says, sounding constrained. You suddenly feel like you shouldn’t be watching. Mettaton clears his throat next to you. 

“Why don’t we go find your boyfriend?” He suggests. You nod quickly, feeling like you don’t belong, and follow him out of the room. He lets out a metallic sigh when he exits, and you smile at him. 

“You okay?” You check. 

“Oh, yes, darling. It’s just family things…” He muses. You bite your lip. 

“Anything I can help with?” You offer. He shakes his head. 

“Oh, it’s my cousin. They just got a new chassis and they didn’t even ask me for any help! I’m glad they're independent, but…” He sighs. “Between that and Burgerpants-”

“Lawyerpants.” You interject, unable to help yourself. 

“Yes, Lawyerpants. Well, Felix…” He sighs. “In any event, I’m beginning to feel like a bit of a burden.” 

“Shh.” You tell him quickly. “You’re not a burden to me. You’re one of my best friends, and my very favorite actor.” You kiss his cheek again, and hug him tightly, careful not to spill champagne on him. He lets out a soft chuckle, and hugs you back. 

“Things have changed so much, so fast.” He whispers. 

“Tell me about it.” You mutter, and pull away, smiling. “C’mon, bud, you need a glass of wine or something, huh?” He nods, still pouting. He’s not going to drink his glass of whatever, but it’ll probably raise his spirits. 

Your spirits are similarly raised when you see Sans, Papyrus, L.D., Undyne and Alphys all laughing about something in the kitchen, and Sans immediately detaches to come over and squeeze your free hand. 

Sure, a lot has changed, you think, grinning down at him, as Undyne holds a bag of icing in your face and then drags you over to the table of half-decorated cookies. It just so happens that, for you, all the changes have been, well…

You begin to decorate a gingerbread dog and, without having to ask, Sans passes you the next color of frosting you need, then picks up your champagne hand and kisses the back, still clearly as gooey as the frosting with love. You turn and grin at him, drawing a heart on the gingerdog. 

Nope, these changes haven’t been even a little bad.


	38. In Which The Author Is Clearly Not Decided on How Sentient Lesser Dog Is

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [ACCURATE](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137439203101/submitted-by-eridanmademewaffles-welpi-cant)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> [CUTE](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137520574376/submitted-by-artanddetermination-headcanon-for)
> 
>  
> 
> [BLUUUUUUPOOOOOO](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137541270266/submitted-by-goddamn-blupo-ahoyhoy-ol-auntie)

The rest of the day is absolutely blissful. When Toriel, Frisk and Asgore come to join you all in the kitchen, you can’t help but notice that some ice seems to have thawed between them. Frisk lets out a loud (probably snail induced) burp, and grins evilly as Asgore chuckles and Toriel shakes her head. It must be tough, trying to impart manners on your cousin, you think, smiling to yourself, then glance at Sans. He’s got a distant look on his face as he stares at Frisk, until you snap in front of him. 

“Hey, bonehead, you with us?” You ask, feeling a little concerned. He turns his head slowly to face you, and smiles, a little relief in his eyes. 

“yeah, yeah, i’m here.” He mutters. “sorry. zoned out.” The evil smile is gone off Frisk’s face now, as they scamper over to pat Sans’ knee. He smiles at Frisk, looking a little tired, and hoists them up on his lap, saying, “alright, kid, we saved the last few cookies for you.” Frisk beams, and reaches for the yellow icing, filling in a star shaped cookie with such concentration that they stick their tongue out. There, everything seems better now. You resolve to ask Sans if anything was wrong later, then pick up a cookie you’d just decorated, munching at the tail of the gingerbread dog. When L.D. whines, you grin and slip him a piece under the table - of course, he’s welcome to his own, but he seems to do his best to adhere to dog rules, and that means begging rather than sitting up and getting his own cookies. 

“No chocolate.” Undyne warns. “He’ll say he can have some but he can’t.” You roll your eyes at her. 

“I know. And I’m not magic, I can’t understand him anyway. Sorry, L.D.” L.D. gives his best doggy shrug and rolls on his back on the hardwood, still chewing his cookie piece. 

Once all the cookies have been decorated, Asgore clears his throat.

“Perhaps we should all have some appetizers before the dinner is finished?” He proposes.

“That’s a wonderful idea.” Toriel enthuses. “There’s so much food as it is! Though, er, it seems that we might be a little short on snails….” You blink, then turn to stare at Frisk, who’s sitting sweetly on Sans’ knee - oh, god, that does something _weird_ and maternal to you that you’re totally unsure of. 

“Dude, how many did you eat?” You say, your eyebrows unwillingly raising. Frisk grins, and presses their fingers together, then pulls them away. 

“a lot.” Sans supplies with a laugh. “must be why you’re so heavy, kiddo.” Frisk gives Sans a look, which is fair since they can’t weigh that much, all things considered. Mettaton lets out a tinkling laugh, and smiles at Frisk. 

“Come along, beauty, you can help me make sure that the table is set appropriately.”

“yeah, give the old man’s knee a break and go help mettaton.” Frisk glares at him, and Sans grins. “you don’t know i’m not old.” He drawls. Frisk pokes out their bottom lip, and Sans sighs. “fine. not old. you’re still squishing my knee.” He grumbles playfully. Papyrus scoffs. 

“YOU WEREN’T COMPLAINING EARLIER.” He points out, and Sans’ eyes narrow. 

“santa doesn’t give gifts to skels who gossip, bro.” He says warningly, and Papyrus grins. 

“SANTA ALREADY VISITED!” He points out. Well, he’s not wrong. Sans groans, and mutters, 

“he could change his mind…” Papyrus isn’t listening. He scoops up Frisk from Sans’ knee and carries them, under his arm, into the other room, saying,

“DON’T PAY ATTENTION TO HIM, WE’LL GUARD THE PRESENTS AND MAKE SURE SANTA DOESN’T CHANGE ANYTHING.”

Mettaton snorts a laugh unattractively, blushes, then follows. Undyne watches them proceed out, then glances at Alphys. 

“W-we’d better make sure that they don’t start opening gifts.” Alphys notes, smiling faintly. Undyne laughs. 

“Read my mind, cutie.” She kisses the dinosaur quickly, then strolls, side by side, after the two miscreants. Asgore chuckles to himself, watching them exit, then looks at the two of you at the table. 

“Santa should probably learn to knock, huh?” He asks, a hangdog look on his face. 

“santa should.” Sans confirms, witheringly sarcastic, while Toriel looks at you strangely. Suddenly, you jump up, almost spilling your champagne. 

“Oh! Uh! Asgore, I forgot to show you your room, if you want to stay! I mean, King Asgore! I mean-”

“Shh.” He smiles gently at you. “My wife already showed me.” Toriel inhales slowly, then nods, and you wonder, for a second, if there’s such a thing as divorce in the monster world. “I hope you don’t mind me staying, but, if, well… if Frisk is going to be here, I’d like to be here as well, for Christmas morning.” He says, his bass voice so low that you can feel the vibrations in your champagne glass. 

“Of course.” You say quickly. “Frisk thinks of you as their dad, so you’re family, right? You’re welcome whenever!” Asgore ducks his massive head and smiles at you.

“Thank you, _________.” He says. “You’re very kind to an old… well, thank you.” He straightens up. “Come, Tori, let’s see what they’re up to.” They exit, L.D. on their heels, and suddenly it’s just you and Sans. He’s got an odd look on his face. 

“You want to go in?” You offer. “You don’t need to get food, babe, I know you’ve had some today-”

“hey.” He clears his throat, then shakes his head. “no. i mean, i’ll eat. but, question.” He looks seriously at you. “you know what he did, right? to try to get us out?” He jerks his head, and there’s no question that he’s talking about Asgore. “you know that he killed humans, right? kids? kids like frisk?” You swallow, surprised by this sudden change, then nod. 

“Yeah. I suppose I do.” You mutter. This had been one of the sticking points in human/monster relations, after all. 

“but, you’re cool with him?” Sans asks pointedly. You grimace. 

“Uh, I’m not sure. I know this much. He made a wartime decision, I think. He’s a king. He has to balance the good of his people with what he’s gotta do.” Sans inhales slowly. 

“it was kids, _______.” You pause, then shake your head. 

“I know. I know. If it were just us, I’d say screw him.” You mutter. “But it isn’t just us. It’s us and Frisk, okay? They’re my family, so if they call Asgore ‘dad,’ then I suppose he’s my family too.” Sans frowns for a long moment, then mutters, 

“fine. then i s’pose he’s mine, too.” You blink at him. 

“Sans, you don’t have to-” 

“he’s your cousin’s adopted dad. that means something.” He mutters. “hate what he did-”

“So do I-”

“but…” He grimaces, then looks up at you. “i intend to stick around. i’ll learn to live with it.” Your heart flutters helplessly at that. He intends to stick around.

“Sans... you don’t have to.” You say helplessly. He smiles at you. 

“sure i do. i’m yours and frisk is yours, so things’ll get messy.” He says with a shrug. You squint at him, then smile after a second. 

“Frisk is my cousin.” You correct. “So, Frisk is part mine. You’re _all_ mine.” Sans takes a deep breath, then gives you a heated look. 

“fuck, _______. you can’t just say stuff like that.” He says hotly. 

“Or what?” You grin, and feel his eyes on you, rather self consciously. 

“or i’ll be very tempted to go back upstairs before it’s polite.” He says with another unapologetic shrug. You look at him for a second, feeling uncertain about this fluttering, wild feeling in your chest. Then he winks at you, and for a split second, something flickers into vision, blue and hot and whirling and bright and … and perfect, in your vision. 

“What was that?” You gasp. He stares at you. 

“what was what?”

“You! Were you doing… it looked like… like a cartoon? Like a heart? Like a cartoon heart?” You attempt, and he stares seriously at you for what feels like a long, long while. 

“you’ve been spending a lot of time around magic, huh?” He asks, looking pleased. 

“Uh, yeah.” You mutter, and when he doesn’t add any more information, add, “Help me out.” He grins at you. 

“okay. you ever wonder, why humans draw a heart the shape they draw it?” He muses. “even though a heart doesn’t look like that?” 

“Uh, sure.” 

“well, what if they weren’t drawing a heart.” He offers. “what if they were just drawing, uh, the thing that makes them a person-”

“A soul!?” You counter, almost immediately understanding what he's driving at. After all, you've seen one before, and yeah, it was in an unmistakable shape... “God! I thought I saw mine for a second the other night, I thought I was going crazy?!” 

“yeah. not going crazy. a soul.” He confirms, looking pleased and a little confused. 

“So… why am I seeing it now? Or, uh, not now, but a few seconds ago?” You mutter. He frowns. 

“dunno. you’ve been spending a lot of time around magic, though.” He repeats. You nod, your thoughts drifting inexorably to last night. Yep, that had been a _lot_ of magic, what Sans had introduced you to.

You try, for a second, to feel affronted, then shrug mentally. 

You’re dating a skeleton. A magical skeleton. A magical, eldritch, ripped from the void skeleton. 

These things are bound to happen. 

\--------------------------------------------

It’s the best Christmas Eve you can remember. The food (which seems to be coming in never ending waves, whenever someone remembers there’s something in the oven) is plentiful. The people are, well, the best. You end up playing charades for a long, long time. When Frisk begins to get sleepy (around the time that Papyrus is desperately trying to act out Aladdin), Toriel and Asgore jointly decide to take them up to bed. Papyrus heads upstairs, with a yawn, soon after. Then it’s just you, Sans, Mettaton, Alphys and Undyne. Well, all of you and a lot of Spider Ciders. 

The game quickly changes to “Never Have I Ever.” It’s not a game that you’ve ever thought you’d play with monsters, but luckily, for the first few rounds, the questions are exceedingly casual. You find out that Alphys has never gone all the way underwater, that Mettaton has never gone out dancing off camera, that Undyne is petrified of red meat. Both you and Sans are forced to drink when, by a combination of plotting, Alphys, Undyne and Mettaton ask some pointed questions. 

“Never have I, uh, e-ever kissed a skeleton”

“Or a human,” Mettaton smirks. 

“Or gone farther than kissing” Undyne says, and both of you put your last finger down simultaneously, each feeling just tipsy enough to clink bottles before you finish your drinks. After that, you’re thinking of evil things to ask Undyne before Sans pointedly says, 

“uh, think that’s a night for us.” 

“But I have so many more questions!” Undyne says, upset. Sans grins, just a little dangerously. 

“mm, you’ll have time to ask them tomorrow. ready for bed, _________?” 

“Sure!” You say, accepting his hand up once he stands and cursing your voice for being so chipper. Undyne begins to chuckle, low and quiet, but you glare at her and her mouth shuts slowly. Sans’ fingers slip around your wrist and you wave a quick goodnight to everyone before the two of you are walking, quickly and silently, back to your room. 

Once you enter, it seems like no conversation is needed. You pull off his t-shirt (smoother this time) and he takes a step backwards, then eyes the door. You’re just leaning down to kiss one of his ribs when you hear a loud thump and turn around, then let out a helpless giggle. 

He’s moved your armoire, the heaviest piece of furniture in the room, in front of the door - with his mind, you assume.

“no more surprises.” He says huskily. You can’t help but nod. “paps and frisk wake up early. let’s not.” 

“I’d really appreciate that.” You admit, and watch his hands, seeing one head towards the hem of your shirt (you never did get to change into something cute) before he hesitates, then abruptly reaches up and takes the bow off your head. “Oh!” You laugh, your eyes moving over his ribcage curiously, “I’d forgotten about that.” 

“it’s been tempting me all night.” He mutters. “almost felt guilty, how much i wanted to unwrap you.” You look up at him, sighing when you see the grin on his face, then kiss him, nudging him back towards the bed. 

“Right back at you, bonehead.” You murmur, and feel an anticipatory tremor through his bones. You’re not wasting time tonight, not letting him render you into a puddle of helpless human. You’ve told him that you love him, and now, everyone is either way upstairs or way downstairs and there’s nothing in your way to show him how much you want him. You kiss a vertebrae in his neck boldly, letting your tongue move across it, and feel him shudder. Good. Now that you’re flush against the bed, the back of his knees touching it, you inch forwards again until he sits down. This time, he gives you enough room to straddle him, and you do so at once, pressing close against him and feeling, without having to ask, the excitement at his core.

“hey.” He says quietly, and you immediately stop, tilting your head. 

“Yeah?”

“so, uh, just to be clear… i haven’t ever… done this?” He says with a wince. You blink at him, settling back on your calves. “like, sex. like… you know. sex sex.” He offers, cringing slightly like you’re about to berate him. 

“Oh!” You say, then smile. “Well, that’s fine.” He looks skeptically up at you, and you smile at him, even wider. “I’ve done it like three times. I’m not an expert.” You admit. “And they, uh, they haven’t been great. They weren’t exactly interested in me having a good time. So… it’s not like I know a lot more than you.” 

“assholes.” Sans grumbles, and you look at him, mystified. 

“You’re mad that nobody’s, uh, how do I put this... fucked my brains out?” You mutter, feeling bewildered. He nods, then shakes his head. 

“heh. no. but… i’m mad that… oh god, _______. you deserve the world. i hate that anyone’s acted like you don’t.” He says, and you feel your heart begin to melt. 

“Look, I just want you to be happy-” You try. 

“so do i.” He says firmly, and grinds against you. “do you want to try?” 

“Yesss.” You hiss, gasping at the feeling of magic against you, even through two sets of pants. “Do you?” He lets out a husky, guilty laugh. 

“since the second i saw you. you’ll tell me, if i mess up?” He whispers. 

“Promise.” You mutter. His smile grows slowly, so slowly it hurts, as he lifts his shirt over your head. You can’t imagine him messing up. He’s just so… confident. As much as you’ve teased him about his “research,” now that he’s started, you can’t imagine wanting him to stop. 

“i want all of you. always.” He whispers, nudging you onto your back and beginning on your belt. 

“I love you.” You whisper, pushing down his shorts. You almost have to squint when his erection, glowing urgently, comes immediately into view. 

“i love you too.” He breathes, pushing your pants down, and with no further ado, he bites your neck, hard, and you have to do everything in your power not to scream with pleasure.

You sense it’s going to be a long night.


	39. In Which TST Had To Take Several Long Breaks From Writing This Chapter To Think About If This Is Really Where She Thought Her Life Was Going

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BASICALLY JUST SMUT  
> So skip to the last p if you want a minor plotpoint and you don't want to read smut!  
> But also, if you feel that you're too young to read smut you REALLY SHOULD NOT BE READING THIS STORY JUST A FUN REMINDER OK GOODNIGHT

Okay, he’s got way fewer clothes on than you, you have to note. Way fewer, and that can’t exactly be fair. Still, he seems dedicated to changing that, pushing your shirt up your ribcage - it’s just that, well, to take your shirt off he needs to move his mouth from your neck, and he doesn’t seem to want to do that either, and in the meantime, you’re just helpless, and stuck feeling fluttery and trying not to make noise. He eventually relents, placing one last soft kiss on the muscle he’d bit, and then gives you a heated look before peeling your shirt off. 

For someone who’d made it clear that he’d never had sex, he certainly seemed confident in his actions. 

You grin down at him when he suddenly hesitates, reaching around your back to unfasten your bra. “uh… same as last time?” He says, giving you a guilty grin. You nod. 

“Same basic concept.” Gosh, you’d better warn him the next time you wore the one that clasped in the front. He snickers, nodding, and a moment later, he’s busy sliding your bra down your arms, his eyes fixed hungrily on your bare torso. “Um. Question?” You ask, feeling awkward, after a moment of this admiration. 

“hm?” He glances up at you, and inhales sharply as you bite your bottom lip - oh, does he like that? You’d have to keep it in mind. All the same, he does an admirable job of trying to meet your eyes. 

“Just… you know, I’m a human… and you’re a monster.”

“kinda.” He smirks. 

“Kinda.” You agree. “I just… you’re really attracted to me, even though I’m so…?” You trail off, making a broad gesture at your body as if that explains everything. He gives you an amused look. 

“uh. clearly.” He murmurs, then when you still look skeptical, he says, “that stuff’s kinda different with monsters. most of us look pretty different from each other. sometimes really different. i just know when i think someone’s hot, i guess.” He says with a lazy shrug. You can’t help but grin at that, and lean forward to kiss him gently. He parts from you after a moment. “but, uh, you…” He says, sounding suddenly anxious. “gotta say, babe, i’m pretty outside the norm of what humans date…” He says, glancing down suddenly at his ribcage, the glowing blue heat trapped between the two of you. You have to think about that. You’d never really thought about dating a monster before him. But, well, shortly after you met him, you’d never really stopped thinking about it. You weren’t entirely sure you had a thing for skeletons in general, but you certainly had a thing for this one in particular. 

“Huh. Guess I’m kind of a freak, huh?” You drawl pointedly, grinding against him again. God, even through your pants (pushed down your hips as far as they could go), that felt good. He grunts softly, then gives you a look. You give him an impudent smile and shrug. “Maybe not a freak. Well, maybe just a little.” You breathe, and kiss his jaw carefully. “Maybe I just know when I think someone’s hot, too.” He has to grin at that. “I told that asshole receptionist at the vet the first day I met you, remember? I still want to jump your bones.” You remind him, and he smiles even wider.

“i got pretty lucky, falling for someone like you.” He muses. 

“Well, you’re about to.” You tease, finally easing off his lap and climbing quickly out of your pants and underwear. 

“what?” He says, totally distracted by the sight of you stripping down. “fall for you?”

“Get lucky.” You stress, and he suddenly gives you a wolfish grin. You’re considering exactly what you want to do, if you should straddle him again, when his hand wraps around your wrist once more. You gasp, then look chidingly at him, but he’s still got that predatory smile on his face - he must know that you enjoy when he holds you like that. 

“get on your back, please?” He asks, and you wonder, again, if it’s entirely fair that it’s his first time and he still looks at you like he knows exactly what he’s doing. You grin and comply, hopping onto the bed and carefully climbing until you’re the right way around on the bed, then look up at him. 

“Yes?” You say innocently, and he groans again, his eyes flicking quickly over you. He doesn’t answer, just moves over you and kisses you roughly - oh, that magic tongue against yours saps all the sass out of you almost instantly. Does he know how easy it is for him to do that, to leave you gasping and wanting more? A bony hand is teasing your breast, and you’re just… your hips keep straining, looking for him, and it’s a relief when he lowers his pelvis slightly and you have something to press against. When he parts from you, he’s got a look in his eyes, and you let him kiss his way down your neck again, but when it becomes clear that his final destination is the apex of your thighs, you rebel, grabbing his hand.

“hm?”

“No, I can’t wait.” You whisper. You’ll feel embarrassed about this later, but right now, it’s the truth. “Don’t want your tongue.” He stares at you for a second, then grins again. 

“what d’you want?” He purrs, and you scowl at him. 

“You.” You finally mutter. His smile grows wider, and he leans down to kiss you, as lovingly as he ever has, and there you are again, that helpless puddle of human that just wants him in you. Luckily, he seems to be on the exact same page, because a second later you feel him, blunt and wanting, poised to push inside of you, and the shock from feeling so much magic, all at once, it makes you moan throatily. He takes a deep breath at that, clearly trying to keep his cool. 

“ok?” He checks. 

“Yes!” You nod quickly. 

“can i-”

“YES.” Oh, you love him for always asking, but right now you’re just about out of patience, and the relief you feel when he begins to push into you-

Well, it doesn’t last long. 

You weren’t prepared for so much, you think wildly to yourself, you didn’t think that anything could feel this good, and your legs wrap around him unconsciously, pulling him deeper, and he groans, and he’s not even moving yet, and this isn’t fair, how he can make you feel so good so fast, and you just can’t give in already, he isn’t even moving…

He’s moving. 

You whimper, gripping his back, your fingers twining between his ribs, and try to hang on. Each stroke inside you feels like pure lightning, if lightning set every bit of you on fire in the best possible way. He’s got a delighted, disbelieving look in his eyes, when he’s not kissing your lips or your ear or your neck, and he’s set the kind of pace that probably would have driven you insane, even without the, uh, magic dick. 

Whatever research he’s been doing should be shared with literally everyone, you think faintly, before your body succumbs and you begin to spasm with pleasure. He groans quietly, and then slows down, his eyes flickering to your own.

“you ok-”

“Yes. Don’t stop.” You manage. He grins again, and brushes his lips sweetly against your cheek - he seems set on making your heart melt, not just your body - and resumes. And god, the process repeats itself, two more times, before the look in his eyes goes slightly wild. You’re feeling limp, almost exhausted from so much stimulation, but when he begins to speed up, you pull yourself back together, tracing his vertebrae, trying not to scream. You clutch at him and whisper, “I love you, Sans,” and he can’t take it anymore. 

He grunts out your name and releases, and your body instantly, almost shockingly reacts, flinging you into the most intense sensation you’ve ever had, as every muscle inside of you suddenly screams *more*. He’s twitching blissfully inside you, and the feeling of pure magic is building and building and - god, you peak again. 

It’s a relief when he withdraws from you, for a second, because you can barely handle that intense of a feeling, and then you feel suddenly, witheringly empty, even with the soft glow of magic still pooled between your legs. He’s breathing hard, watching you, and you can’t tear your eyes from him. 

“ok first time?” He finally manages to rasp, and you let out a wild laugh, pressing your forehead to his sternum and holding him close. 

“I don’t think human beings are de… designed to feel that good.” You yawn, suddenly feeling very, very tired, and you nuzzle his neck. 

“oh.” You can hear the disappointment in his voice. “uh, next time, if you want, we can go a little easier-”

“Don’t you dare, bonehead.” You whisper, lips moving against the vertebrae of his neck, and he shudders, then yawns too. 

“i love you.” He whispers. “should we use the shower or something?”

“In the morning. Legs won’t work.” You rationalize, and look up just in time to see a very, very, smug look - perhaps the smuggest he’s ever looked - cross his face. 

“k. morning.” He says, still catching his breath. “time is it?” 

“Late.” You guess, too exhausted to turn your head. Your eyelids are already drooping. “We should sleep. Paps and Frisk. Christmas.” He lets out a low chuckle, and strokes your hair. 

“yeah. but… wow.”

“You’re telling me.”

“wanna do that again sometime?” 

“Heck yes.” You chuckle, snuggling in closer. “Tomorrow work for you?” 

“my schedule’s open.” He says, giving you a very languid, very satisfied wink. “night babe. sleep well.” 

“I love you.” You whisper again. 

“i know. love you too.” 

\----------------------------------------------

You don’t make it until tomorrow. In the early hours of the morning your eyes peel open, your mind still spooling with the wildest, hottest dream you’ve ever had. He’s snoring softly, but you can feel him hard against your back, and the slightest shift to look at him wakes him up. He eyes you slowly, then shows a sharp mouthful of teeth, his eye snapping blue. 

“more?” 

You nod helplessly, and lean into him again, a leg wrapping around him.

\------------------------------------------------

You wake up very early the next morning, in spite of yourself, feeling sore and exhausted and absolutely blissful. There’s a split second when you look anxiously at the door, but thank god, the armoire’s still in front of it. You yawn, looking at the watery sunlight filtering in through the big window, then snuggle up into the bony arms wrapped posessively around you. It’s no good. Now that you’re up, you’re up. 

“Baby.” You whisper in his ear. Well, where an ear would be. “It’s Christmas. You want to get up?” He lets out a soft grumble. “C’mon.” You cajole. “Don’t you want to see if Santa came last night?” You tease with a grin. 

“nnn. couldn’t have came as much as i did.” He grumbles sleepily, and your eyes go wide. 

“I didn’t know we could do dirty puns!” You muse out loud, feeling delighted, and the obvious happiness in your voice makes him peek his eyes open and chuckle. Awh, he really does look more tired than you feel - and you feel tired! “Okay, okay. Stay in bed, bonehead.” You whisper, and kiss him softly, then wriggle away to avail yourself of the shower, feeling sticky and still a little swamped with magic. 

When you return from the bathroom, dripping and barely clothed, there’s the sound of four eager fists hammering on the door to greet you. 

“LAZYBONES! IT’S TIME FOR PRESENTS!” Papyrus shrieks. 

“ **Yeah, Santa didn’t take any back, you lied, Uncle Sans!** ” You chuckle for a moment, finding a dress, and then your sleep deprived brain catches up with you. You hadn’t just heard Frisk’s tablet. 

You’d just heard Frisk.

More than that, in your head, neatly, the correct signs for what Frisk had just said spooled through your brain. It was like a whole corner of your head was suddenly unlocked, like you were fluent without more than the most basic lessons!

You glance, very skeptically, at your snoring, magical boyfriend, and then back at the door. 

“you’ve been exposed to a lot of magic recently,” He’d said last night, and that was true, but…

Oh, you were going to have a hell of a time explaining this.


	40. In Which There Is A Christmas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> merry christmas, nerds. sorry it's, uh, 26 days late. 
> 
> come visit your old trashmom at my [tumblr](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

“Sans.” You walk over to his side of the bed (oh, weird, when had he gotten an official side?) and shake his shoulder. “I just heard Frisk.”

“i know, s’did i, not a liar, just said santa might take ‘em back…” Sans grumbles into the pillow. You clear your throat and cross your arms, waiting. Suddenly, he sits up. “wait. run that by me again.” He says, his eyes wide open. You give him a pointed, mildly stressed look. 

“I just. _Heard._ Frisk. Through the door.” You say. He blinks slowly. 

“...oh.” He mutters. 

“Is this, uh, is this a normal side effect to, um…” You gesture broadly between you. He grimaces, then gives you a very guilty shrug, the wheels in his head still clearly turning.

“not that i’ve ever heard of?” He admits. “i feel like i would have, you know, we’re not the first human/monster couple to exist?” He mutters. He sounds like he feels absolutely wretched. You take a deep breath. 

“But… you’re not a monster.” You remind him.

“uh, right. not exactly.” He says, looking upset. 

“So, we’re kinda flying blind here, huh?” You mutter, sinking to a seat on the bed, and trying to ignore the renewed sound of hammering fists against the door as Papyrus screams,

“WE KNOW YOU’RE AWAKE, LAZYBONES! COME ON, IT’S PRESENT TIME!”

“go on down, paps, we’ll be down in a second.” Sans calls, and maybe the tone in his voice is enough that Papyrus merely sighs and accepts it.

“HMPH. FINE. WE WON’T WAIT FOREVER THOUGH!” He insists

 **"Be nice, Papyrus.”** Frisk urges, and you gulp in a breath. That sensation of sound in your *brain*, the sudden flood of signs that accompanies it, it’s… it’s a little overwhelming. It’s like if you’d, at twenty-two years old, just figured out how to open your eyes for the very first time. All that new data is hard to parse. 

“I’M ALWAYS NICE!” Papyrus insists as the two of them hurry down the hall. You glance back at Sans, biting your lip. He’s studying you miserably. 

“shit, ________. i dunno. seeing my soul yesterday, well, frisk can see souls, i didn’t think it was that weird, but…. this is a big change. do you feel okay?” He says quietly. You think about this. 

“I feel amazing.” You admit, stretching your arms experimentally, as if this will reveal some hidden flaw. Nope, you’re… well, still sore, but you feel great. “And, I mean… okay, so I can understand my little cousin now.” You grin suddenly. “God, that’s kind of awesome, right?” He nods skeptically. “Besides…” You muse, after a moment. “It’s not like humans haven’t been able to do big magic stuff before, right? It’s not totally unheard of, mom and dad have all these old books in the library about the sorcerers from forever ago, Mt. Ebbot was a hotbed, right? I mean, we put up the barrier!”

“...you’re not reassuring me right now, babe.” Sans drawls. You blink at him, then groan. 

“Okay, bad example. That was tactless.” You admit. “But, hey, I’m not turning evil or anything, look, same _________, big dork, just now with translation abilities, apparently.” You promise him. He takes a deep breath. 

“you’re sure?” He mutters. You think about it. 

“Yeah. Pretty sure. I mean, hey, I’ll tell you if I notice anything else, but…” He winces at you when you shrug. “Hey, c’mon. I’m okay, really.” You say. “Here. Look.” You tap the space by your heart, where you now know your soul to reside. He concentrates, staring through you, then sighs and nods, looking a little relieved. 

“still you.” He whispers. In spite of yourself, you feel a little relieved to hear that.

“Yeah. Still me.” You confirm, and lean against him. “Maybe this is a good thing? I mean, this is what every kid wants, right, to wake up and suddenly, bam, you’re Hogwarts material?” He blinks at you. 

“um, what?”

“...Harry Potter?” You offer. 

“again, what?” 

“Oh my god, we’re going to need to address that later.” You mutter, looking at him, then sigh when he doesn’t smile. “Don’t look so upset, bonehead, I’m sure it’s all fine.” You urge, reaching out to take his hand from the top of the blankets. 

“i just don’t want to hurt you. i never thought…” He winces again. 

“Hey. Hey. Not hurt. A little ... a lot surprised, that’s all.” You say. 

“love you for who you are, though. never thought you needed changing.” He mutters, and you squint at him. 

“Well, look. Uh. I’m not entirely sure what I am right now. You still love me?” 

“of course!” He says, shocked. You give him a crooked smile. 

“Good. So, it’ll be cool, we’ll figure it out.” You lean against him until he’s supporting you, feeling quite conscious suddenly that you’re just in your underwear, and kiss his bony brow. He sighs. 

“you know, it’s cool if you freak out later.” He whispers. “won’t blame you for being mad at me.” 

“I’m not mad. I have… um, superpowers, now! That’s pretty cool!” You rationalize. He slowly, tiredly, lets out a chuckle. 

“mhm. and how are we going to explain why you have ‘superpowers’ to everyone else?” He drawls, a bit of light back in his eyes. You grin at him. 

“I dunno. You did science. Hm? Maybe me understanding Frisk is your big gift to me for Christmas.” He lets out a low chuckle at that. 

“think that’ll work?”

\-------------------------------------

“S-so Sans did-” Alphys begins, squinting at you. 

“-science.” Sans interjects.

“Science.” You agree. 

“And now you can understand Frisk.” Undyne says dubiously. You’re all crowded around the tree and the pile of presents in whatever sofas and chairs you could pull up, and you’ve, reluctantly, dropped the bomb. Well, you’d had to. You couldn’t just pretend not to understand Frisk. 

“Yeah! Great christmas present, right?” You say, overly enthusiastic. Frisk, innocent soul that they are, agreed wholeheartedly. 

“ **Yes!** ” They sign quickly. “ **Thank you, Uncle Sans! It’s so cool!** ” You feel your smile growing a little tired, and Sans is flushing blue as he says, 

“uh, don’t mention it, buddy.” 

“Papyrus!” You cry, very quickly, sensing that more questions are coming. “Don’t you want to open your presents?” 

“YES! I’VE BEEN VERY PATIENT BECAUSE I’M AN ADULT AND I NEED TO SET A GOOD EXAMPLE FOR FRISK AND GHOST!” Papyrus, who has not been very patient, exclaims, pacing urgently back and forth in front of the tree, the purring cat in his arms. You grin.

“Well, Papyrus, why don’t you let me take care of Ghost for a while while you get started?” Asgore says, studying the cat with interest. Toriel smiles at him for a second, then glances away, looking embarrassed, as Papyrus carefully hands your cat over. Asgore cradles the old cat with great care as Papyrus hollers and dives for the presents, and after that, it’s a free-for-all. 

“________! Yo, thanks!” Undyne cries, unwrapping the fish tank you’d carefully picked out for her. “Yo, check it out, sweetie, it’ll be like we have Waterfall at home with us, once I pick out some fish!” Alphys beams at Undyne, then ducks as Papyrus and Frisk begin making their action figures fight above her head; Frisk has clambered onto the arm of the chair she’s sitting in. 

“Frisk, watch Alphys’ head!” You call, and feel all eyes settle on you for a moment before you realize that you’ve spoken in that special, just-for-Frisk tone. Then Undyne snorts, diving back into her pile, and you realize you should get started on yours. God, you’ve never had so many gifts, you think, stretching a tired leg to pull a stray present closer to you. And, worse, they’re all so thoughtful! Papyrus has given you a new set of cat dishes for Ghost, designed for elderly cats that don’t like to lean down so far. Undyne and Alphys have teamed up to get you a custom stereo for whatever your new car is - Alphys grins when you open it, and promises she’ll help set it up with you, which is a decent hint that it’s more than the average stereo. Lesser Dog trots over to lay a tug of rope toy on your lap, which he’s had in his mouth all day and seems like more of a toy for him, but… hey, it’s the thought that counts, and he’s overjoyed by your gift of peanut butter treats and ear scratches in return. Mettaton, oh, he’s gotten you what feels like a whole new wardrobe, going totally overboard with designer bags and shoes and outfit after outfit, though he stresses, 

“My fashion friends, darling, you’d be doing them a huge favor if you wore this, you’re something of an icon now!” 

Toriel and Frisk have teamed up to give you a set of handmade ornaments, one huge pawprint and one tiny handprint with the words “cousin” and “aunt” written in their distinctive scripts underneath. “You guys made this yesterday?!” You sputter, and they both grin at you. 

“We wanted to give you something to make sure you remember this year by.” Toriel explains, and you sigh happily, yanking Frisk over to give them a hug. They tolerate this for a moment, hugging you back, then laugh and squirm away, bounding back over to their pile and crowing when they unwrap the Calvin and Hobbes book you’d gotten them - the ecstatic, wordless joy pierces your brain for a second, so happy that it’s almost painful, but you’re already getting used to it. Not, of course, that it stops your overly concerned boyfriend from squeezing your hand and whispering,

“still ok?” You smile, wrapping an arm around him, and nod. 

“Perfect.” You assure him, and kiss his cheek, ignoring the soft “awwww” that Alphys makes when she sees this. 

Asgore - er, Santa’s - present is a surprise, but absolutely lovely. It’s an ancient book, you realize, opening it, and then, when you open the page, realize immediately what it is; an illustrated bestiary of all the water dwelling animals and monsters from the underground. It must have been made hundreds of years ago, since you can see the aging of the pages and the worn spine. The colors of the ink, though, are as bright and vivid as anything you’d ever seen. 

“Asgore…” You sputter. “This is… it’s too much!”

(Sans squirms, and you can practically feel the jealousy radiate off of him). 

“It’s nothing. I told Santa you’d like it.” He says, a twinkle in his eyes. Ghost is relaxed in his arms, totally limp and purring like a motor. “After all, your boyfriend and Papyrus had so much to tell me about the aquarium you work at and how much you know about the animals, and I figured that Santa might like to help you expand your knowledge.” You take a deep breath, and nod. 

“You figured right.” You mutter, very carefully turning a page. Wow. 

“I TOLD ASGORE, SANS BARELY SAYS ANYTHING AT WORK UNLESS HE HAS TO!” Papyrus emerges from a pile of discarded wrapping paper to announce, then dives back in. 

“mine next.” Sans says quickly, and you laugh. 

“I don’t have any left besides yours, babe. Gotta save the best for last, right?” You tease, grinning, and accept the compact package. When you open it, you stare at it for a second, confused. It looks like a top of the line cellphone, which is amazing, but-

“it’s a monster phone.” Sans explains quickly. “latest model. does all sorts of cool stuff, look-” He taps a button, there’s a flash of light, and then boom, there in the air in front of you is an extensive inventory of every single thing you own. “pick something. uh, something small.” He urges, and you blink, then comply, selecting a book you know you’ve left on your bedside table. There’s a flash again, and it’s sitting on your lap. 

“Whaaaaaaaaat.” You mutter, looking at the book, then glance up at a grinning Sans. “Holy… cow.” You correct your language quickly, remembering Frisk and Paps. “Sans, this is… WOW.”

Alphys and Sans exchange a high five behind your back. Mettaton clears his throat, then Sans lets out a laughing sigh and high fives the robot as well. You beam at the three of them, feeling a little emotional, and hug your boyfriend close. “plus, now you can talk to frisk.” He adds, extremely deadpan, in your ear. You blink, then groan, realizing that the two of you had inadvertently ruined a huge chunk of your gift last night (apparently). 

“Well, good, then we didn’t really lie.” You murmur back, then stand up. “C’mon. I gotta show you your present.”

You jerk your head towards the direction of the stairs, and Undyne whoops. You roll your eyes at her - really?! - and say, “You guys can all see in a second, I just want him to see it first.” 

“didn’t have to get me anything.” He mutters, standing up. You scowl at him, and he chuckles reluctantly and takes your hand. “k. lead the way.” 

You do so, climbing up one, two, three flights of stairs, until you’re at the very apex of the mansion, the fourth floor, in front of a locked door. You take a deep breath, then reach in your pocket and hand him the key. 

“didn’t even realize this place had… well, yeah, there’s four floors of windows, counting that turret shape up top…” He muses. “s’ this the attic?” 

“Not exactly.” You say quietly, and watch as he turns the key in the door. Oh, if there’s somewhere you haven’t been in your house since your mom and dad died, it’s here, you think, hearing the hinges squeak as he pushes it open and steps inside. 

“holy shit.” He mutters, his eyes wide, as he looks around the large, round room he’s uncovered. It’s your parents’ lab, of course, their pride and joy, resting in the cupola of the house as its crowning achievement. Sans is speechless, stepping inside, his eyes wide. There’s equipment - oh god, there’s so much machinery up here, waiting to be called back to life, and even though you know a lot of it’s old, you also know that a lot of it was miles ahead of its time. 

And there’s books, shelves and shelves, all waist height, all jam packed. These aren’t your parents’ college texts, these are the books they’d used in their work, heavily marked up, and a further pile, haphazard on a desk, of notebooks.

In the center of the room, dead center, aimed at the circular window in the ceiling, is a witheringly expensive telescope. 

And around every single wall, barring the one with the door you’d entered through, there are windows, and windows, and windows; it’s nearly a full panorama, letting you see the sea, the land, the sky, anywhere you choose to look. 

Sans is frozen, taking this all in. He holds still, only his head swiveling, for a long, long time. 

“Is this… okay?” You finally have to ask. 

“__________.” His voice nearly breaks with emotion. “holy… oh…” He turns, breathing hard, and leans up and kisses you, holding you tight and practically refusing to let go. When he finally pulls away (not caring that you’re now a panting, disheveled specimen of a human) he’s grinning like you’ve never seen him smile before. “this is the most amazing thing anyone’s ever… you’re sure you…. wow.” He says, looking around the room again. You smile slowly, feeling an immensely satisfied glow in what you’re beginning to recognize as your, well, soul. 

“I did good, then?” You ask quietly. His jaw drops, looking at you in disbelief.

“heck yeah.” He finally mutters, and kisses you again, and you can feel the bliss radiating from the center of his chest, beneath his ribcage, and almost instantly you can figure out the allure, why he’d been interested in touching your soul. Tangibly feeling how happy he is, being able to recognize that, it’s intoxicating even from this distance, and you can’t help but think that if you were just a little closer-

No, not yet. He’s still freaked about the fact that apparently his … ugh, there’s not a neat way to put this … that he’s apparently screwed you into a state of universal fluency, you decide. And apparently, that includes being quite aware of his soul, when you’re thinking about it. Better wait. Let him get used to the idea first. 

“merry christmas.” He murmurs, looking quite seriously up at you. “this is one of the most amazing...oh man, i can’t wait to show papyrus, i think i’ll put my pet rock right here-” He wanders away from you, a boy in a toy store, beginning to really get into all the different things in the lab. “what does this do?!” He taps at a machine.

“I don’t have any idea.” You admit. 

“i’m gonna find out!!” He says gleefully. “oh man.... oh man!”

And for once you get it, that sappy shit that you’d heard so many times in movies and TV shows. Seeing him this happy is better than any gift you could possibly have received.


	41. In Which Alphys And Mettaton Both Independently And Privately Consider Moving In Forever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SOME PEOPLE ARE A LITTLE JELLY OF THE SKELLY!!!!  
> is how I would describe some science nerds
> 
> FUN CORNER:
> 
> Valuable conversations on the [THIS FIASCO](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com>TST%20Tumblr</a>%20have%20lead%20to%20<a%20href=)

Excited Sans is a hell of a thing. It’s actually wonderful to watch. He’s normally so relaxed, so laid back, so… well, you know the word Papyrus would choose, but lazy or not, right now he’s just… amped! He hugs you two more times in between opening cabinets and staring closely at different bits of machinery and pacing a long, slow, marvelling walk around the telescope. 

“think we could see some of the other planets with this?” He asks, and you grin. 

“Definitely. We did it all the time when I was a kid. You ever see Saturn’s rings before? Or the red spot on Jupiter?” He blinks at you for a second, then very slowly shakes his head. 

“no.” He whispers. “you really think, with this…” He looks at the telescope again, and you smile. 

“I know you can.” You promise. “Tonight, okay? If it’s clear out?” He takes a deep, hesitant breath, then nods, looking… well, a little distressed. You frown, trying to figure out what has him upset. “We don’t have to if you don’t want to, Sans.” You say softly, and he shakes his head quickly. 

“no! no. i just…” He looks back at the room, then the telescope, then you, and mutters, “i keep thinking that the rug’s gonna get yanked out from under me when i least expect it, y’know, that i’ll blink and when i open my eyes i’ll be right back in my dad’s lab underground doing the same thing over and over again…” He gulps in another breath, then looks seriously back at you. “‘m just so happy.” He mutters, helpless, and you can’t help but comfort him, moving forward and kissing the crown of his skull. He smiles up at you, but suddenly, you see, under the happiness, true distress in his eyes. 

“What happened to you, Sans?” You whisper. “Why do you think that things aren’t gonna stay like this?” He glances around the room, then sighs. 

“you know the barrier.” He begins. 

“Yes. Very well.” You mutter dryly. 

“you know that nothing could escape it.” He says, and you realize that this is one of his explanations, the kind that you now suspect he’s been rehearsing in his head to be able to tell you, like a professor addressing his students. Oh, he’d be a very hot profess-

Not the point, ________. 

“Right. Not even you.” You say, and he bares his teeth in a smile. 

“‘xactly. look, of all the monsters down there, though, i wasn’t the strongest. not by half. it’s… i dunno. i mean, literally, i don’t know the whole story. i think maybe frisk does. i’m pretty sure frisk knows more than i ever could… look, all i know is this, while the barrier was up, there was a force in there, there was something, something… dark.” He says, his eyes distant pinpricks. “i don’t know. i have guesses, but… look, i really don’t know. i just know…” He takes a moment, shaking his head. “whatever it was down there could... _fuck_ with time. like, i can do it a little tiny bit, if i think about it. i can be somewhere a few seconds before i should be able to, even, uh, with the doorways.” He waits for your shocked look, and seems a little disappointed when you just nod.

“Oh!” You say, shrugging, “Um, you mentioned space and time before. I kinda didn’t figure, you know, if you can punch a hole in space... I’m imagining you have a little leeway on _when_ you come out, not just where.” He eyes you suspiciously, then shrugs to himself. 

“okay. taking that, uh…. _real_ well, babe, but sure.” He mutters, clearly a little unsettled that you’re not freaking out. You’re not entirely sure why you’re not freaking out either, or asking more questions, it just seems obvious to you suddenly, that yeah, time and space have to be bundled on some level.

He’s still studying you, but eventually, he clears his throat. “anyway, yeah, so i’ve got a few seconds to work with when i’m making a shortcut. whoever else was down there, though, they could punch through time as easy as i could with space. right?” He checks. You’re not sure you get it, but you nod. “and they... they were...can’t imagine the kind of soul that would be like them. they… they did everything. everything awful a creature could do.” He whispers. “never showed their face to me, but, i’m used to time, used to ripples, i could remember bits and pieces, specially from the end of a timeline. i think i lived through a lot of them.” He mutters. “a lot. and babe, the things they did, the things i remember… they hurt all my friends. they crawled inside Frisk and wore ‘em like a skin. they killed…” He stops, breathing hard. “doesn’t matter. doesn’t matter.” He tells himself quietly, shaking his head. 

“God… Sans, I’m so…” You’re wordless for once, stumbling up against concepts you don’t know how to articulate. Finally he gives you a tired, crazed smile.

“your cousin, though. they must have seen everything reset as many times as me. i dunno. maybe not. maybe… maybe they just did everything right, just once. like the ghostbuster in that movie.”

“Groundhog Day.” You supply, then grimace, feeling tactless. He nods, looking appreciative, though. 

“exactly! yes. exactly. saw it on tv late at night at alphys’. know the sick thing?” He flashes a toothy smile that, for once, doesn’t make you melt. It nearly makes you shudder. “that movie ended, and they played it again, the network, twice in a row. ‘s sick, right?” He whispers, and you nod, trying to figure what it would be like, to be in Sans’ shoes. (Well, Sans’ beat up Chucks.) Things like that must seem absolutely brutal to him, even if he couldn’t remember every single day he’d lived through. “anyway. i dunno how many tries it took, how many frisk remembers, but when the barrier came down...we don’t really know what happened then, just all of a sudden the kid was on the ground and the barrier was open, and whatever was messing with time stopped.” He whispers. “dunno why, dunno how, and the kid just clams up whenever i ask. i don’t ask too much anymore. it’s been more than a year.” He whispers. “but i still think, most nights… what if it starts again? what if that thing’s out here now? what if you humans were right to build the barrier, to keep whatever that thing was inside?” He says, and you shiver. 

“Babe, I’m so sorry.” You mutter. “I can’t imagine living that. I can’t. I mean.. that’s an actual nightmare. No, it’s worse...” He sighs softly, then hugs you around the waist once more, leaning his head on your shoulder. 

“i just don’t wanna lose this. or you. especially you. i’m so goddamn happy.” He says quietly, and you stroke his back, trying to reassure him. 

“It’ll be okay.” You whisper. “You’re out now. You’ve had so long without that happening, right?”

“right.” 

“It’s over. The barrier let all sorts of awful things fester, but it’s over. You’re allowed to be happy, Sans.” You assure him. “And we’re not gonna let anyone get hurt anymore. We’ll take it a day at a time. We can do that.” He shakes his head. 

“don’t want a day at a time. i want _a long time_.” He says, sounding determined, then glances up at you with a hangdog expression on his face. “i know. too soon. i’m pushing things too fast with you, babe.”

“No, no, you’re not-”

“i am.” He says, sorrowfully, and you just want blissful Sans back, the one who wanted to look at all the books and the telescopes and the graduated cylinders and the pipettes. “i know i am. i just… i think i’d go insane, waiting, to tell you how i feel.” He whispers. “i mean, it’s not fair of me. i know for a fact that you’re who i want and need and love. i’ve touched your soul.”

“D-” You start, then take a breath. “Do monsters not do that often, then?” He lets out a soft laugh. 

“not really. in attacks, in kids’ games, sure, we might touch with magic. a few of us do magic to change the color of your soul for a while, it’s a trip, you should see alphys’... but that’s different than actual touching.”

“How?” You say quietly. 

“touching, not with magic, physically, is… it takes a lot of trust.” He says slowly. “it tells you a lot about a person. told me a lot about you. told me that i’d never not be in love with you.” He says, looking down at the ground. 

Oh. Well, wow. If that’s true, it’s… it’s big. It’s very big. Hell, it’s huge. It’s so huge that you don’t know exactly what to do with it. He sees the look on your face, and shakes his head. 

“i know. i know. too fast. i know it’s insane, i just…” 

“Do you trust me?” You hear yourself saying. He looks wide-eyed at you. 

“implicitly.” He says softly, but clearly truthfully. 

“Then… then, can I try? To touch yours?” You stammer, flushed and embarrassed and hopeful. He squints at you. 

“d’you think you _can?_ ” He whispers, and you think about this and nod. 

“I mean.. I mean, yeah, I think maybe I can right now.” You whisper. He leans his forehead against your shoulder for a second, then steps away.

“let’s start small. can you see it?” He murmurs. You shake your head ‘no’, but then mutter, 

“But I can feel it. It’s right here, right?” You tap the center of his chest, squinting, and he chuckles in spite of himself and nods. 

“yeah. right there. okay… focus on that feeling. don’t look with your eyes. focus on it with your mind. the way you hear frisk, can you hear me?” He asks, and you bite your lip and focus…

But nothing happens. You stand there for a while, trying, but you can’t figure out what to do. 

“I’m sorry.” You finally mutter. “Guess I can’t…” 

“hey. hey. s’okay.” He says, and kisses you softly. “you really want this?”

“Yes!” You breathe. “I want to know what you know! I want to know you the way you know me, because I love you!” He smiles at that, and hugs you again. 

“i love you too.” He murmurs in your ear. “i never thought… god, i never thought i’d love someone besides paps. now, imagining life without you is…”

“It’s not gonna happen.” You assure him, feeling a little scared that you’re promising that to this monster you still barely know, who you love so wholeheartedly all the same. 

“good.” He says, squeezing you, then blinks. “hey, they’re all coming up here, i hear ‘em on the stairs.”

“Can we try again later, with your soul?” You ask quickly, and he nods just as quickly. 

“whenever you want.” He promises, and kisses you once more before parting and walking to the door, calling, “hey, guys, up here, you’re gonna freak when you see this!” 

You’re still reeling, slightly, from the heavy emotions, but when Papyrus bursts in first, his eyes wide, and takes in the lab with a barely audible screech, you have to grin, particularly when he bounds forward two big steps and lifts you off your feet in a hug.

“THANK YOU SO MUCH, HUMAN! THIS WILL BE MY BROTHER’S FAVORITE!” He says, so happy for the sake of Sans that you get a big, dopey grin on your face. Aw, you love Papyrus too. You pat his shoulder when he puts you down, and look at the door, waiting for everyone else to make it up. 

“W-woah.” Alphys steps in next, looking astonished. “Mettaton, get up here!” She hollers a second later. Mettaton groans, but clangs up the stairs rather sulkily, though even that pretense is dropped when he emerges into the lab. 

“...Goodness.” He mutters. Sans is leaning back against a counter, looking tremendously pleased with himself now. 

“oh. yeah. _______ got me a lab for christmas.” He says nonchalantly. 

It’s entirely possible that the best gift you’d gotten him, though, was the two looks of staggering jealousy from Mettaton and Alphys. You’d never - well, no, you _had_ seen him look more self-satisfied, more pleased with you. But this, this was a very close second. 

“This is unreal.” Alphys announces. 

“There’s so much…” Mettaton mutters. 

“yeah.” Sans smirks smugly.

“CAN WE LOOK THROUGH THE TELESCOPE!?” Papyrus yelps, excited, ruining the silent moment of astonishment. 

“We’re all gonna, Paps.” You promise him. “Tonight, okay? Don’t want to hurt your eyes looking now.” 

“Would it hurt his eyes?” Mettaton muses, and when Sans glares at him, he quickly agrees. “Tonight, though! I must say, I’m excited!”

“I-It’ll be a perfect end to Christmas.” Alphys agrees. “But… ________, Undyne wants you downstairs, she says she doesn’t know how to cook a dead bird.”

“Uh, I assume she means the turkey.” You say apprehensively. “Sure, let’s go down and help.” You start towards the door after Papyrus, Alphys and Mettaton (the latter two muttering about how some skeletons get all the luck) when you sense, rather, Sans hanging a little ways back. You turn and grin at him. “You want to stay up here and check some stuff out, bonehead?” You offer playfully. 

“really? you don’t mind?” He asks. You shake your head. 

“Course not! This space is yours now, I want you to enjoy it!” 

“god, i love you.” He repeats again. “world’s best girlfriend.” 

It occurs to you, halfway down the stairs, that based on everything he’s told you, he actually means that. He thinks he’ll love you forever. He thinks you’re the best girlfriend in the world. 

Well, it’s hard not to feel a little self-satisfied yourself, after that.


	42. In Which Undyne Comes To Terms With The Fact That You Are Not A Cinnamon Bunny

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this one's a little late?  
> Because it's also really unexpectedly long?  
> (That's what she said!)
> 
> FANART FUN 4 FUN FELLAS:  
> [Actually this kinda makes me a little sniffly](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137828612206/submitted-by-krakklekat-ignore-papyrus-foot)
> 
>  
> 
> [I realized I messed up linking this the other day, but this is the kind of quality trash I have grown to expect from u children and I love u very much for it](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/137784210671/the-little-mermaid-starring-undyne)
> 
>  
> 
>  

Undyne’s alone in the kitchen, staring dubiously at the raw turkey on a roasting pan. Mettaton trots into the kitchen with you, but Undyne shakes her head at him. 

“Out.” She tells him. “We need some girl time.” 

Mettaton raises an eyebrow very slowly. “Rude.” He pronounces, flips his hair pointedly, and then stalks slowly off. You grin after him, then nod at the turkey. 

“Need a hand?” 

“Please?” She mutters. “I only know how to cook fish and spaghetti. This is a totally new kind of dead animal.” You grimace at that. 

“I guess you monsters didn’t eat all that much meat, huh, before you got out?” You say, walking over to the turkey and checking that the oven was on. Undyne shakes her head no. 

“Nah. I mean, I ate lots of fish and snails. And now I’ve had, like, everything.” She boasts. 

“Oh yeah?” You tease, finding the stuffing that Papyrus had been preparing yesterday and grabbing an apron - no use staining your cute dress. “Did you know that there’s places that fry up alligator?” 

“Oh my god, really?” She says, her eye widening a little. “Can we go? Oh, man, that’s so cool!” You grin at her enthusiasm. 

“Sure, we’ll find one. I’d like to try it too. I think Mom and Dad let me try some when I was a kid, but… you know, haven’t been so adventurous the past few years.” You chuckle, beginning to stuff the turkey. She snorts. “What?” 

“_________, you’ve had more adventure in the past month….” 

“Okay, okay.” You laugh. “Maybe I just haven’t been able to afford exciting stuff until recently. Have to say, having roommates totally helps on food expenses. You sure you and Alphys don’t want to just move in?” You suggest innocently, raising your eyebrows. Undyne grins slowly.

“Oh, sure, you say that now. But, considering how fast you and Sans seem to be going, you’ll probably be married by like next Tuesday, so-”

“Undyne!” You complain, rolling your eyes, then sigh. “It’s… all pretty fast, isn’t it?” She’s watching you closely, and she picks up on the small amount of nerves in your voice. 

“Yeah. But… like I told you. Wartime. People get close pretty fast when the whole world feels like it’s against you.” She says reassuringly. “But...you’re happy, right? You’re happy with Sans, even though it’s fast? Because if you need someone to tell him to back off, I will, I’ve got your back, punk!”

“No, no, trust me, I’m ecstatic.” You say, which is kind of hard to say with a straight face while your hand is inside a cold, slimy turkey. Undyne grins at you. 

“So you’re okay?” She checks. “I mean, don’t get married next Tuesday, I’ve got plans then, but-”

“Ha.” You say pointedly, then bite your lip. “Hey, can I ask you a question? About monster stuff?” She looks dubiously at you, and says,

“I feel like that look on your face should start to scare me. Last time you looked like that I got taught all about condoms.” You burst out laughing at that, and, finished stuffing the turkey, quickly wash your hands. 

“Poor Undyne had to hear about icky human sex.” You tease. “Can you get the oven for me, please?” She beams and swings the door open, and you struggle to get the enormous bird in, then nod for her to close the door. “Okay. Now all we need to do is baste it every half hour or so. Not so bad.” You nod at the turkey. “Man, should I be drinking wine or coffee?” 

“Why not both? Mix em!” Undyne says enthusiastically, and you shudder. 

“Coffee.” You decide, and pour yourself and Undyne a mug, then hop up on the counter. “I dunno if this question is rude, I’m sorry. But, um, have you and Alphys… touched each other’s souls?” You ask. Undyne blinks at you, her cheeks coloring slightly. 

“It’s pretty personal, but… Well, yeah, once I let her touch mine. Pretty recently, actually, for our one year anniversary.” She says softly, then adds, “Or, d’you mean, like with magic, because I’ve done that lots, I taught her how to make a shield…”

“No, no, I meant the first way.” You admit, feeling embarrassed without being sure why. “It’s just that, well, okay, so Sans touched mine-”

“WHAT.” Undyne sputters, spraying coffee on the table. “I mean, there’s moving fast and then there’s… Did he at least explain what it was going to be like? I mean, _________! Alphys won’t let me touch hers and I’ve known her forever! It’s…. it’s PRIVATE! Tell me he told you what it meant!” She demands. You grimace, thinking about how much trouble you’re getting Sans in. 

“Not… really. Can you keep your voice down?” You whisper. “I don’t want anyone… look, it was a spur of the moment thing. We’d had a really intense night.”

“What, last night?” 

“Uh, no. Well, I mean, last night _was_.... heh, intense, but no, the night that Paula was on TV, there were some reporters taking pictures of me in the back yard and Sans opened up a portal to hell and threw them in there and I had to talk him into bringing them back, and then he told me about what it was like to have Gaster as a dad and things were so intense, and my soul was… you know, out, and he was just as worked up as I was and he asked if it would be okay if he touched it and I said yes because it felt right…” You stammer. She takes a deep breath. 

“Woah.” She finally mutters. “Okay. Alright, wow. We can talk about some of that later but...” She studies you. “Are you okay with it? He didn’t mess with you or hurt you or anything right?”

“Uh, yeah. It was the most intense thing I’ve ever felt, but… it was so good, Undyne.” You whisper, thinking about that moment. “I was… I felt better than I… I mean, he loves me so much, and I just… I felt like everything came back, all the parts of myself I’d lost, all at once. It felt like being healed from all these wounds I never knew I had. I was crying, and he stopped almost right away because he thought he hurt me, but it was nothing at all like being hurt…” You murmur, your cheeks bright red. “And then, god, yesterday I saw his soul for a second, and then today I can talk to Frisk and I just, I want to give him what he gave me, I want him to know how I feel about him, and I know I’m moving fast, but…” She’s giving you a soft look now, no longer half as panicked as she realizes how incredibly positively you feel about the whole experience. 

“He loves you, huh?” She murmurs, and you nod quickly. 

“He told me yesterday. And I… I know, I know everything I said before, but… I do, I love him too.” You admit. “I’m almost scared, how much I love him.” You say, and she pauses, groans, then sighs, a strange combination of happy and resigned. 

“The two of you are so damn cute, it hurts sometimes.” She grumbles. “But, I mean, you both just seem so happy together! Well, I still think it’s really fast, but… Maybe you guys… I dunno. Monsters have this old term, you know, ‘soulmates?’” She suggests, and you giggle. 

“Humans have that word too, Undyne?” 

“You do? Weird!” She says, chuckling. “Thought you guys didn’t really believe much in the soul these days.”

“Well, we didn’t, maybe, before you guys came out anyway, but we just used it to mean like, two people who just belong together.” You say, quietly, and she nods. 

“Exactly. Some people’s souls are just complementary. They just go together. They’re not the same, they’re just like a matched pair.” She mutters thoughtfully. “They said that was true about the king and queen.” You wince. 

“Ah, yes, _that_ famously successful marriage.” You point out, and she raises an eyebrow. 

“I don’t know, dude, they seemed pretty dang friendly to me, this morning. Wait, hold up, speaking of which, hold everything the hell up, this is what I wanted to talk to you about. What the hell was that this morning, the whole ‘science’ thing!?” She demands. “Because I saw you heading upstairs with Sans last night and... fuhuhuhu, science was definitely not on your mind?” 

“Um…” You glance at your coffee, trying to decide whether you should tell her everything or not. 

“We didn’t hear any screams this time…” Undyne’s thinking this over. “But now you’ve got concealer on _two_ spots on your neck, so…” She slowly grins, and then passes you a large bowl of brussels sprouts, saying, “Here, make yourself busy while you tell me.” You groan; she said it like you telling her was already set in stone. You bite your lip, hopping down from the counter and grabbing a cutting board and a knife, then finally sigh, accepting that yes, you’re going to tell her everything, if only because you, damn it, you kind of want to brag.

“Holy shit, Undyne.” You finally murmur. “He’s…. oh my god.” You mutter, blushing and grinning down into the sprouts. 

“He’s good then?” Undyne says, smirking and looking tremendously pleased. She glances at the door, and lowers her voice even more, until it’s barely a whisper. “He, uh, he got you there?” She says with a wink.

You bite your lip. “Ummm... “ Okay, don’t sound smug, don’t sound smug, “The first time, he got me there _four times,_ dude.” 

Undyne gives you an absolutely delighted look. 

“FOUR TIMES?!” She hisses in a barely constrained undertone, then blinks, “WAIT. ‘THE _FIRST TIME???_ ’”

You can’t help it, you give her a big, huge, absolutely delighted grin of your own. 

“I mean, we were going to leave it at once, I was so tired, but then I was dreaming about him and...I woke up in the middle of the night and he woke up a second later, and….” You say, then giggle helplessly, “Um, he was suddenly very interested in it, so…” You say softly, recalling the look on his face with very little effort and feeling quite warm. She shakes her head. 

“Unbelievable. This is absolutely unbelievable.” She sighs. “The two of you look like the most innocent little cinnamon bunnies, and it turns out that the only thing that you have in common with bunnies is that you’re fucking like ‘em-”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” You cut her off, grinning, and finally remember the sprouts in front of you and begin chopping them. “But, uh… so here’s the thing. So last night, couldn’t understand Frisk. This morning? I can. Now, I’m no scientist compared to Alphys or Sans, but even I can make a pretty educated hypothesis as to why I’m suddenly able to speak soul to soul. I mean, even after he came the other night I could basically feel magic inside me for hours...” You whisper again, unable to stop your overshare in your desire to just talk about this with someone who won’t freak out about hurting you. 

Well, Undyne would certainly freak out, but for a different reason. Her eye goes round and wide, and she lets out three seconds of laughter that she’s just barely managing to keep quiet, then she clamps her hand to her mouth, taking a few seconds to calm down. 

“Oh my god.” She breathes, looking horrified and delighted at the same time. “Oh my god, oh no, this is hilarious.”

“Hilarious?” You sputter. Oh, god, privately you’re pretty sure you agree, but Sans would be so mad if he realized that. 

“Oh, hahah, no, I meant, this is very serious and dignified business.” She says in her best officious voice, then looks indignant. “Wait, so you didn’t even use the condoms? I had to go through that whole gross explanation and imagine Sans’ invisible magical wiener _for nothing_?” 

“He said we didn’t technically need to!” You protest. “And, um, it’s not invisible, it’s bl… and, and, be quiet!” You recover quickly, realizing you’re veering off into stuff that Sans might not want shared. “I don’t want Frisk to hear!”

“Well, apparently the only reason that Frisk might be able to hear is because Sans told you that you didn’t need a condom!” Undyne hisses, that horrified/delighted expression still on her face. “Oh my god, this is so ridiculous. Is he freaking out? I bet he’s freaking out.”

“Uh, yeah. He’s not coping well. I think he thinks he broke the human.” You agree, and she snickers. 

“Oh, god, this is such a great gift. Merry Christmas to you Undyne.” She says to herself, then blinks. “Oh my god, __________. What happens if… I mean, we’re assuming that he’s, uh, donated some magic to you, hm?”

“That’s a very tactful way of putting it.” You snicker, slicing a sprout carefully. 

“So, um… how long do you think you hang onto that magic for? Is there a shelf life?” She whispers, then smiles even bigger. “Oh my god, do you need regular refills?” She says quietly, just delighted. “I swear to god I read a doujin like this once, punk.” You blink.

“What’s a douj-”

“FUHUHUHU NEVER MIND!” Undyne says quickly. “Let me help you with those sprouts, buddy!” She becomes a whirlwind of prep work to make up for her lapse in judgment, and you immediately resolve to look that word up, then, suddenly, grit your teeth. God, what if she was right? What if you suddenly lost your ability to talk to Frisk? What if…

“I have no idea if I can run out of magic. I don’t even know how to use what I have. I guess…” You pause for effect, knowing that she’ll like this, “I’m going to need to do some experiments and find out.” You mutter. Undyne loses it, dissolving into helpless laughter. 

“God, I’m having a very good Christmas.” Undyne finally sighs, wiping a tear from her eye, and you smirk at her.

“Me. Too.” You drawl, and she begins snickering again. “Probably not as good as Sans, though-”

“No shit, boneboy got to home plate at last! And then he got to run a victory lap-”

“No, no!” You laugh. “I mean, I got him, well, I gave him the key to mom and dad’s lab, up on the fourth floor, and he’s so excited!” You sigh softly. “It’s adorable.” You say, a little lovestruck, and Undyne snorts again. 

“I called it forever ago. You guys are such lovenerds.” She teases. 

“Um, you know who else is excited? Your girlfriend.” You point out, and Undyne snickers. 

“Oh yeah? Is she jealous?” Undyne wants to know. You shrug, demurring. Undyne’s smile grows wider. “Well, I’m not exactly done giving gifts. I got one left. ‘S gonna be a good one.” She says mysteriously.

\-------------------------------------------------------

After that, you can’t help but pester her about her gift, but she stays clammed up, refusing to budge on the subject. After a while, you have to move on, especially when Papyrus and Frisk come into the kitchen to help you and Undyne cook. Papyrus has never made stuffed shells before, so he’s almost inspiring in his level of concentration as he reads and rereads a recipe you’d pulled up on your brand new cell phone - oh, man, that thing was lightning fast! You would need to check out all of the features when you had a second, because you were pretty sure that this was something that certain people in the tech sector would kill for, literally. 

Frisk is adorable, the perfect helper in the kitchen, and very slowly you begin to get used to their voice on the inside of your skull. It’s not painful, listening to Frisk - they’re generally very sweet and soft spoken - but it still feels overwhelmingly new. Each time they speak, you feel yourself flinching a little bit. At first, Frisk looks a little upset by this, so you have to explain, 

“It’s okay, cuz. It’s just so new for me!” As you speak, you experimentally begin to sign along with your words, and Frisk brightens right up. 

“ **That’s so cool. I’m _so_ glad that Uncle Sans did science on you!** ”

(Undyne can’t handle this, and has to excuse herself into the pantry to disintegrate into hysterical laughter). Frisk stares after her for a second, then shrugs and resumes mixing ricotta and egg for Papyrus. As you continue to talk quietly, it becomes less and less of a shock to your head to communicate, until finally, it seems quite ordinary. You know you don’t need to sign along as you speak, that Frisk can understand you just fine, but you still end up doing so because it feels so wonderful and exciting to suddenly have this entire dictionary of a new language, just unlocked in your brain overnight. Frisk seems to like it too, and occasionally corrects your fingers slightly or nudges a hand - even though you know how to do all the signs, you don’t have the muscle memory to perform them perfectly each time. 

After a while, when you’ve been communicating easily, you find the courage to ask, “Hey, Frisk, Sans says that you can see souls. Is that true?” Frisk nods happily. “Can you explain to me how you do it?” You ask slowly. “Do you have to concentrate or can you see them all the time?”

“ **Gotta concentrate!** ” Frisk chirps in your brain. “ **You can’t look with your eyes, though. You’ll just get your eyes tired. You have to…** ” Their little brow wrinkles as they try to explain this to you. “ **You have to use your soul and your head. Like how we’re talking. We’re using signs, but we don’t need them, we’re using our souls and our brains! So when you look for a soul, you don’t need to use your eyes, you just have to concentrate on your soul and the other person’s!** ” They explain brightly, and tap the spot over where their heart is located with their small hand through their adorable striped sweater. “ **Mine’s right here. Look with your soul! It’s red. Our souls are close in color! Maybe because we’re family?** ” They say shyly, then frown. “ **But I bet my birth mom’s soul looks like doodoo.** ” They say quietly, and you burst out laughing and nod. 

“You’re totally right, kiddo.” You assure them, and take a breath. “Okay, let me try. Hold still.” You try to reach out for Frisk’s soul, using your own, but you can’t help it, you’re still searching with your eyes, hoping that you’ll see -

“ **Close your eyes, almost all the way.** ” Frisk orders. “ **That’s what I do. Use your brain!** ” Welll, when they put it like that….

You squint, and try to reach out again, then sigh and close your eyes entirely, feeling like you’re pushing your soul physically… and then, in your head, something finally snaps into place, and you see Frisk’s soul, a perfect, perfect pure red, ideal for the perfect pure child, you think, gasping. You open your eyes, and it disappears, but you’ve got it now, you get the knack of it, and, like those Magic Eye games you played when you were a little kid, where the senseless jumble of shapes suddenly forms an image, you concentrate and stare into the middle distance and boom, there it is, sitting around Frisk’s heart, glowing somehow both behind and in front of that striped shirt. 

“I did it! I can see it! Frisk, kiddo, you have a beautiful soul!” You exclaim. Frisk blushes and beams, running up to hug you, and you, intoxicated with this sudden gift, pick them up and swing them around, then lock onto Papyrus. You have to reach a bit further for his soul, but boom, there it is, a sky blue that blazes with its intensity. 

“CAN YOU SEE IT, HUMAN?! CAN YOU SEE MY SOUL?” Papyrus demands as soon as he figures out what you’re looking for. 

“I can! Paps, I can, you have such a pretty soul!”

“OH! OH, DEAR HUMAN, HOW NICE OF YOU TO SAY THAT! YOU HAVE A VERY PRETTY SOUL TOO!” Papyrus says, his cheeks staining red, and then Undyne elbows her way over. 

“Me next! Me next!” She laughs, and you grin and look, and boom, it blossoms into view, the same teal as the spear you’d seen her conjure up before, and you gasp. 

“Oh Undyne, it’s so wonderful…” You whisper. All three of your friends look overjoyed, your happiness so contagious that they begin comparing souls as if they were seeing each other’s for the first time. 

“Papyrus, you do have a very nice soul.” Undyne tells Papyrus admiringly. He scoffs. 

“YOURS IS SO GREENY-BLUE! MINE’S JUST BLUE!” He demurs. 

Frisk is rooting around in their pocket for something as you stand back and smile, concentrating until you can see both of their souls, then all three souls at once. Finally, Frisk produces the object - an MTT brand compact mirror, and passes it urgently to you, saying, 

“ **Now you can finally see yours!** ” You beam, and open it up, about to look, then suddenly stop. 

“Wait, wait. I want Sans to see this.” You say, feeling breathless. “Guys, I’ll be right back down, okay?” 

“OH, YES, HURRY _________! MY BROTHER WILL BE SO EXCITED!” Papyrus crows joyously. 

“Mmm, no hurry! He’ll be excited. Maybe someone can get their, um, battery recharged!” Undyne drawls, grinning her pointiest grin, and when you glare at her and Frisk blinks, confused, she tells Frisk, “Mettaton, I mean, sweetie. Mettaton has a battery.” Oh, smooth, Undyne.

“ **Undyne, you’re so silly....** ” Frisk is saying, but you don’t stay to listen, you hurry down the hall, then take the steps, two at a time, all the way up three flights of stairs. 

When you get to the top and swing open the door, flushed and out of breath, you almost have to stop to grin - Sans has found a labcoat from somewhere and is already wearing it (and looking very at home in it), and he’s got a pile of notebooks open in front of him - your parents’ notes - and a very big microscope. He turns quickly, looking as content as Ghost in front of a fire, except for his eyes, which spark with excitement, and his soul, which is… oh, god, it’s a lake on a clear day, it’s the ocean, a waterfall, an iceberg, the blue shadow on the dark side of a snowbank and the crisp, blinding white of the light side, it’s the dark, peaceful waters of the quiet room in an aquarium that a young teen used to sneak into to find someplace safe and calm, it’s all those things, all at once…

“babe, your parents were amazing. they were brilliant!” He’s enthusing. “i’ve never seen anything like - hey, are you okay?” He interrupts himself, seeing the look in your eyes.

“Never been better.” You breathe. “Sans, your soul. It’s… It’s incredible. It’s the most incredible thing…” He looks confused for a second, then suddenly, he looks even more excited. 

“you can see it! you figured out how to see it!” He says, thrilled.

“Frisk showed me!” You pant, still a little out of breath from that mad dash up the stairs. “Sans, baby, you’re… it’s beautiful. It’s incredible!” You repeat again, your eyes fixed in that middle distance, watching the colors swim underneath and above and through his labcoat, his shirt, his ribcage...

“oh, you haven’t seen anything yet.” He mutters, looking so very proud of you, and takes your hand, pulling you over to a wardrobe by the door - right, of course, he had to get the labcoat from somewhere! He swings the door to the wardrobe open, revealing a long mirror on the inside of the door, and puts his hands on your hips, guiding you so you’re facing the mirror squarely. 

“look.” He urges, nodding at you in the mirrored glass, and you reach out, you reach to yourself, half reach, half push, and your soul flickers into view. And you understand, now, that everything he’s told you is right. You’re an ember, and you’re the almost colorless flame, the top part of a candle, and the light by the wick too, and you’re the color of the sun - you’re almost too bright to look at, but you’re a sunspot too, and you’re the afterimage you get when you’ve been staring at a lightsource for too long and you close your eyes, and you’re the stars, too. “look at you.” He whispers. “look at how beautiful you are.” 

You can’t even deny it, it’s… oh, it’s true. This soul is something beautiful. You can hardly believe you’ve had something like that in you this entire time. 

You reach out again, just a little, and in the mirror, you can see his soul flickering now too, just next to yours, and you think about what Undyne had said, about monsters believing in soulmates, in souls that perfectly compliment each other, and you have to admit…

“They look perfect together, don’t they.” You murmur, and he takes in a deep, delighted breath, then nods. 

“perfect.” He agrees, slipping his hand in yours, and you stand there for a long time together, just looking. You don’t know about fate, you don’t know if you believe in design, you don’t know if you want there to be such a thing as destiny, but you know this: 

These two souls belong together.


	43. In Which An Opportunity For A Great Pun Comes Up And Sans Commits To It

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jeez kids.  
> You kinda got ol TST all worked up here. PRetttttty big outpouring of support from you kiddos. TST's gonna use that money to eat like the lower middle class to which she aspires. 
> 
> Seriously, I am forever grateful to all of you. I just kind of can't believe it. It's a real 'you like me, you really like me!' moment. I'd kinda given up on writing as something I'd ever get paid for but...
> 
> Man, oh man, if this whole thing isn't such a confidence booster. I couldn't have done it without you guys. I mean, I literally wouldn't have, without everyone just constantly interacting with me (not just complimenting, but genuinely interacting!) I just... well, you guys actually care. And it means so much to me, that you guys care. Bwah, I'm gonna get all messed up about this. Just let me express my true and sincere appreciation to all of you. I never thought that any of this would happen, when I started writing again. Hoo boy I love you guys. 
> 
> Oh and [this my home](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

After a while, you manage to tear your eyes from the mirror, and the souls you’d been examining flicker out of sight. It makes you feel a little sad, but you just need to reach into that feeling of controlled power in your chest, and you’re reassured. Your soul isn’t gone for good, after all, it’s still there and so is his. You’re just… taking a little break. Now that you are, you realize;

“I’m tired.” You mutter, surprised, and he nods, much less surprised. 

“sure. you’re doing something totally new. it takes work.” He says with an apologetic smile, and you yawn and nod. 

“I suppose that makes sense.” You admit. “Mm, it’s not exactly fair, is it, all my muscles are sore, now it kinda feels like my soul is too. Or my brain, or … uh, something, I guess we’re getting out of the realm of biology.” He tilts his head. 

“all your muscles are sore?” He asks, and you raise your eyebrows. “...nope, sorry, i’m not getting it.” He says, after a few seconds creep by where a pointed stare still doesn’t elucidate anything. 

“Babe, you gave me a workout last night!” You finally laugh. He blinks, then lets out a low laugh, looking a little guilty. 

“huh. sorry, i kinda forgot?” He says sheepishly, and you wince, feeling a little blindsided. He’d forgot. Wait. He’d forgot?! Last night had basically fundamentally changed your world, and this jerk who claimed he’d love you forever had forgotten about it? He’s staring at you again, like he can’t comprehend why you look suddenly upset.

“hey, uh, sorry, I guess i should be more… i dunno, sensitive about it, it’s just not something i can really figure out, since, you know, i don’t have any…” He says quickly, and it’s your turn to blink at him. 

“...What?” You mutter, your anger melting very rapidly into confusion. He grimaces. 

“you know? having muscles? or, um, me not having them? kinda don’t know what sore feels - heh, hey!” He cuts himself off as you groan, laughing, and flick his shoulder. Suddenly you feel about a thousand kinds of oversensitive. “jeez, what just-”

“God, I thought you were saying that you’d already forgot about last night!” You laugh guiltily, and he groans too, shaking his head. 

“not, uh, not really likely to ever happen.” He says, snickering now that you don’t look upset. “ever. man, i thought you were really mad at me because i forgot muscles got sore! and like, i was just sort of… uh, i don’t know how muscles work!” He laughs, looking awfully relieved. “well. i mean, academically, sure, i just don’t have ‘em. it’s all electricity, you know, humans use electricity and chemicals same way monsters use magic.” He can’t help but add, and you smirk at him. 

“Nerd.” You accuse. 

“yep.” He says with a shrug and a grin. “it’s cool stuff, though, you should _read_ your parents’ logs here, they’re geniuses! i mean, they were.” He says, giving you an apologetic glance, but you nod and tell him with a gesture to continue. “i mean, they had the idea to convert the power from the barrier into electric energy from somewhere, right? they were all tied up in this stuff, they were checking into all sorts of things. a lot of it’s honestly like nothing i’ve ever seen before, it’s so…” He struggles for a big enough word, then grins and shrugs. “it’s so awesome!” He says, and for a second, the look on his face is entirely familiar, since you’d seen the same look on your parents’ faces a hundred times, when they thought they were getting into something really, really interesting in the lab. It makes you feel thrilled and a little mournful all at once. “god, i wish i coulda met them.” He says, glancing back at the journals, and you sigh, smiling and nod. 

“Me too.” You say quietly. He looks at you for a second, then closes the distance between you, hugging you carefully. 

“you ok?” He checks, and you nod, pressing your cheek against his lab coat. 

“Yeah. It’s just… they’d have been so happy.” You say. “For you to be here, trying to understand their work. An actual monster, in their lab…” You say, thinking of the thousands of questions they’d be firing off. You’d barely be able to see your boyfriend, if they were still alive. They’d be so busy grilling him, you’d have to steal time, you think, not at all resentful at the thought. After all. “They’d be pleased for me too. For me to have found someone who makes me so happy.” You say, rubbing his back, and he looks quite seriously up at you. 

“really? even though… you know, even though i’m not a human?” Sans asks, and you nod. You never doubted that. 

“Yeah. They always just wanted me to be happy, whoever I ended up with. If I ended up with anyone at all. They told me to choose the path that felt, you know, brave and right.” You say, and he smiles again, looking a little sad. Right, well, that made one set of parents. Sans had grown up with a real jerk as a father, the way he told it. “You think your dad would have been upset?” You ask quietly. He hesitates, then shrugs. 

“dunno. humans have kind of a bad rap in the underground, but… look at your soul.” He says softly. “hard not to love someone like you. maybe even my old man could have looked past the human thing, ‘specially since we made it past the barrier in the end.” He muses, then shrugs, looking around. “doesn’t really matter, though. i know it was the best thing for me, meeting you.” He says confidently. 

“...Yeah? Even with all the attacks and the paparazzi and Paula and everything?” You test, and he laughs. 

“yeah. i mean, i’m used to bad stuff. but i mean, it’s good for me, too, that i’ve got you.” He says, and glances around. “time was, a place like this, i wouldn’t be able to sleep or eat or think until i’d figured out every single thing, every half written question in those books, all the questions of my own. i’d be up here for as long as i could get away with. i’d get weird!” He laughs, then gives you a cheeky grin. “now? i want to do christmas stuff with my friends and family. not planning on pulling the full insomnia routine either.” He promises. 

“Oh yeah?” You say, giving him a grin. He smirks. 

“yeah. i mean, don’t get me wrong, still a big fan of science, but, uh, you’re way more fun to spend the night with.” He says, and you roll your eyes, leaning down just a little to kiss him once more. 

“Good. I’ve got plans for you tonight.” You say wryly. 

“ah. heh…” He grins, looking flustered and _very_ pleased with himself, but when you tap his chest again, where you know his soul to be now, he suddenly gets a much more intent, anticipatory look on his face. “yeah.” He says, sounding a little hopeful. “...i bet you actually can, now, since you can see them.” He shifts slightly, then looks up at you, clearly trying to keep the hope off his face. You suppose he doesn’t want you to be disappointed, if things don’t work out. “you’re learning… i mean, you’ve had a lot of changes, like, crazy fast. just saying. you’re sure you’re still okay?” He checks, and you nod. 

“I’m feeling amazing. Sore, sure, but…” You trail off, and can’t help it, even though you’re tired, you still have to check again, testing the different colors of his soul. He smiles at you for a second, a lovestruck boy, then clears his throat. 

“better take a break and rest up, or you’ll pass out in the turkey.” 

“Might anyway, turkeys make you sleepy, they’ve got some chemical in them.” You laugh, snapping back to attention, and then, in the interest of being correct, add, “It’s called Tryptophan, and actually I think it’s a placebo, like you’d need to eat an entire turkey in order to get sleepy from it, there’s not that much in a serving.” You say, and roll your eyes when his grin grows wider. 

“nerd.” He drawls, shrugging out of his lab coat and hanging it neatly up. “c’mon. let’s be social.” You grin. He was clearly particular about cleanliness in the lab, which was kind of something, since he had about three shirts haphazardly draped over your desk chair already (and he hadn’t been staying with you for all that long).

“Sure. Let’s be social.” You agree, and accept his hand, walking out of the lab together. 

\------------------------------

He watches out for you all through dinner, when your eyelids do begin to droop. Maybe it’s the turkey, or maybe it’s that you just can’t help it, you need to keep making sure that you haven’t lost the ability to see souls. Everyone’s abuzz with wonder at the topic for a little while, but slowly they seem to grow more used to it, and the topic shifts from your new skills to old stories from the underground. 

It’s nice to listen to these, even if, occasionally, they seem to bring old issues to a head. Mettaton hates talking about how he’d fought Frisk, even though the two of them are best friends now. You get the sense that he’s ashamed of his behavior, but there’s nothing to be done. Frisk doesn’t pick up on the vibe, and keeps recalling excitedly how the crowd had loved it when they ate a Starfait, or how Mettaton had made them write an essay on air. Mettaton shakes his head slowly, and mutters that he was a total ass, and you have to elbow Sans when you see him grinning, not at all nicely, and nodding at Mettaton. Frisk still recalled the event fondly, clearly, but you can’t help but think of how small your cousin is now, and how much smaller they must have been a year ago. It’s hard to believe that anyone could ever want to hurt them, but the general consensus seems to be awkward guilt, mixed with remorseful laughter, when Frisk discusses these fights. Only Sans and Papyrus are exempt; to hear Frisk tell it, Papyrus had pulled his punches pretty seriously and had clearly never intended to hurt Frisk (Undyne coughs at this, then gulps down nearly an entire beer, her face flushed). 

“ **And Sans… Uncle Sans would never, ever hurt me, no matter what he says.** ” Frisk concludes their story, still laughing, and you glance over at Sans. He’s still smiling widely, but the lights in his eyes are almost gone. 

He’d said he’d lived his time in the underground over and over again. He’d said that sometimes it had been worse than others. /something had crawled in Frisk’s skin/ He’d said, or something like that. You feel goosebumps rise over your body, and shiver slightly, then take in a sharp breath when Sans finds your hand under the table and holds it tight, clinging to you, just out of view from everyone else, like you’re an anchor. 

It takes him several minutes after the conversation shifted to something lighter for him to pull his hand away. 

Finally, dinner is over, the dishes are all done, and Undyne clears her throat. 

“So, I’m hearing some big game about some telescope.” She drawls, and you grin. 

“You’ll have to ask Sans, it’s his.” You say, and he laughs. 

“no you don’t. but yeah, let’s go! ________ says that you can see the rings around saturn with it.” 

“There’s rings around Saturn?” Mettaton says.

“mhm. s’pose the only rings you’ve seen are around _uranus_..” Sans drawls with a smirk. You cough on your wine - yes, you’d moved to wine - and glare at him. 

“REALLY?” You sputter. 

“Does Uranus not have rings?” Mettaton asks, looking confused.

“yeah, does it not, ______- ouch!” Sans complains when you swat playfully at his shoulder, an evil smile on his face.

“Look, this is really hilarious, but I want to look at the stars!” Undyne whines. Alphys gives her an odd look - probably because it’s unlike her to pass up a good Uranus joke - but then nods.

“Yeah! L-let’s go!” She urges. 

“I’LL SET THE TELESCOPE UP!” Papyrus cries, taking off for the stairs. 

“...uh oh. see you up there.” Sans says, staring after his brother, and then takes a quick step, disappearing in thin air (presumably to beat Papyrus to the tremendously expensive telescope). Mettaton sniffs. 

“Well, he could have taken us all up.” He complains, and you shrug, saying, 

“Eh, needed more wine anyway.” He approves of this idea, at least, and so the two of you end up being the stragglers of the group, but much more equipped to wait out the jostling for a turn at the eyepiece with a bottle of wine that you’ve smuggled up with you. You both agree that Sans probably wouldn’t approve of anything spillable in the lab, but, well…

Well, Sans had laughed at an accidental Uranus joke about you, so he deserved it!

When you get up there, you have to laugh as everyone, even Toriel and Asgore immediately shout,

“Close the door!” They don’t want any light filtering in, and when you’re up there, you can see why. It’s been a long time since you had last seen this view, but it really hadn’t changed much. On a clear night like tonight, through the windows you can see fields of stars in every direction, over the water and the treetops and partially obscured by Mt. Ebott looming on the other side of the bay. It doesn’t hurt to be up here anymore, not with so many people you care about, you think, sitting cross-legged on the ground next to Mettaton and looking around happily. Mettaton sighs, smiling, and the two of you simultaneously sip (or pretend to sip) your wine, just enjoying the moment. Sans is standing by the side of the telescope, letting Papyrus have a turn (“WOWIE! IT’S REALLY LIKE WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE IN THE CARTOONS!”). Undyne and Alphys are lined up impatiently, looking excited. Toriel is sitting on the opposite side of the room from you, next to Asgore, with Frisk balanced in her lap. Lesser Dog is on his back, right in the middle of things, looking up at the stars through the window and panting contentedly, his tail wagging slowly. 

“k, bud, let someone else have a turn now.” Sans finally tells the marvelling Papyrus. 

“OH, RIGHT! SORRY, UNDYNE, YOU CAN GO NEXT!” Papyrus urges. Undyne shakes her head. 

“Nah, you first, sweetie.” She insists. 

“Ummm… I t-think I’m too short.” Alphys begins, and Sans grins. 

“no worries. got a stool. shorties gotta look out for each other.” He pushes it over, then winks at you sidelong, and you forgive him for the awful pun, winking back. Alphys marvels for a long time, with much different observations. She’s not content with the rings around Saturn just being pretty, nope, she needs to know the why too, what they’re made of, how long they’ve been there… You’re embarrassed by how little you remember, but you do your best to either tell everyone or look up on your fancy new phone (which does find the answers astonishingly quickly.) Finally, Alphys pulls away from the eyepiece, grinning enormously. 

“Whatddya think?” Undyne demands, grinning, for once eye-level with her girlfriend. 

“I-I-I think this is the b-best day I’ve ever had!” Alphys laughs, getting ready to hop down from the stool.

“nerd.” Sans chimes in helpfully.

“Watch it, punk!” Undyne snaps, then quickly turns back to Alphys. “Wait! Wait. Stay there. I um, I need to do a thing!” She says quickly. Alphys laughs nervously, but stays up on the stool. “Okay. Heh. Just. Okay. So, I, um, I love you a lot.” Undyne is saying, pacing in front of the stool. “And uh, you know, I’ve loved you for a long long time. And I was nervous. I didn’t want to take, uh, you know, I didn’t want to take the risk and then see you trapped, I guess, make you think that you were stuck with me. But, um, now.. we’re out. We’re really here. We made it out together.” She whispers. “And I figured, hell, if she wants to run now, she can-”

“Undyne, I don’t want to-” Alphys says, eyes wide.

“I know, baby. I know. You’ve made that very clear. For us, it was never about being trapped and getting desperate. We found each other in spite of all that. And now we’re out, for real, and I know how lucky we are. We’ve got each other, and jobs, and friends and family, and… a future. We’re not stuck anywhere. We’re not stuck together, either. We chose this happiness. We choose it every day.” Undyne says, uncharacteristically serious now, and even though she’s just addressing Alphys, you can feel it resonating with everyone else in the room. “I want the world to know that I choose to love you, no matter what.” She says, hoarse, and suddenly drops to a knee, and the room goes absolutely silent, except for Alphys, who lets out a wild laugh and exclaims,

“YES!” 

“But, sweetie, I haven’t even-”

“I said yes!” She laughs again, hopping down from the stool and bounding into Undyne’s arms. Undyne holds still for a second, then beams and kisses Alphys, fumbling in the pocket of her leather jacket for the ring box and finally managing to find it by the time she’s pulled away, sniffing happily. 

The room is no longer silent - quite the opposite, everyone’s clapping and cheering and your face just aches from how hard you’re smiling, especially when Undyne manages to get the ring on Alphys’ talon and she waves it excitedly around. “It’s beautiful, Undyne, I didn’t need all this!” She’s laughing. For once, she isn’t stuttering.

Across the room, you could swear that you just saw Asgore kiss Toriel’s cheek.

You’re about to nudge Mettaton, who hasn’t noticed, when Sans clatters to a seat next to you, grinning, and leans in for the kind of kiss that makes you care a lot less about everything, even royal intrigue, and you’re suddenly having all sorts of interesting thoughts instead, when there’s a sharp yelp and everyone looks up. You stand up slowly. 

Lesser Dog is staring out the window towards the beach, which marks the rear barrier of the back yard. There’s a… a mass, moving along the beach towards your back yard. For a second, your stomach twists at the fluid way it’s moving, thinking of some monstrous slug or something that’s heaved itself off of the abyssal plane to conduct some awful affair on land, but Papyrus spots it first. 

“It’s humans.” He whispers, and the fact that he’s using a normal tone of voice chills you to the bone. It is people, you can see that now, a tight group of - god, it must be fifty, sixty. None of them are using lights - they must be navigating by the starlight alone. All of them are wearing black. 

“good eyes, l.d.” Sans whispers, giving the dog a distracted scratch behind the ears, then looks quickly at Undyne, Mettaton, Papyrus, Asgore, Toriel. “you guys ready?” He whispers. Undyne grins a furious, starving grin. 

“‘Bout damn time.”


	44. In Which Nothing Much Happens

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was a goddamn blast  
> that is all.

Toriel takes a deep breath, looking at the mass of people out the window, then back at the rest of you. They’re moving slow, picking their way through the snow. You’ve got time. 

Just not much. 

“Perhaps I should stay here, and make sure that Frisk is safe?” She whispers. Sans gives her a sympathetic nod, but Asgore grits his teeth. 

“No, Tori.” He mutters. “I’m going to need you out there. We’re going to need every fighting hand we can use. Alphys will stay back with ________ and Frisk, just in case, but… we’re going to need all hands on deck.” His demeanor is totally different now; he looks grim and stubborn and above all serious. Alphys gulps. 

“I-I can’t d-do much-” She begins, and Undyne shakes her head. 

“You won’t have to, sweetie.” She looks up. “Guys, we gotta move.”

“Right.” Asgore clears his throat. “______, please call the human police. Everyone else, no killing. Do you all understand?” Sans’ eye flashes irritably, and you swallow. “No killing. I know you can all handle that. Unless your life is in danger, don’t even think about it.” Asgore announces. You swallow, and pull out your phone, calling 911, as Frisk stumbles over to you, 

“ **I can fight!** ” They insist, and you grit your teeth. There is no way in hell that you’re letting your cousin anywhere near the danger these people present. 

“You’re not fighting. You’re staying with me.” You whisper, and jump when the dispatcher picks up. You rattle off the story, feeling detached, as Asgore finishes his battle plans. 

“Sans, Papyrus, I’ll need you two front and center.”

“we’ll go down now. paps can set up.” Sans mutters, and you grimace at that, not to mention the look on Papyrus’ face when Sans offers this so easily. Papyrus looks like he’s just won the lottery, and your stomach churns. Still, you can’t focus on that. You wait on the line with the dispatcher for a while, trying to update, until Sans taps your shoulder, demanding your attention, and you pass the phone wordlessly to Alphys. 

“babe. safest place in the house is the cellar. i poked around. you’ve got a double reinforced steel door down there.” Sans says, and you nod slowly. “take the kiddo and alph down there. don’t open it for anything but one of us, okay?” He says, and you nod. “k. opening a door to the backyard. watch your head, asgore.” He mutters, and there’s a rent in the lab, behind the telescope, and a door to the backyard, snowy and cold, materializes. 

“Baby. See you soon. Keep them safe.” Undyne tells Alphys. “Love you, okay?”

“Yeah. Love you too.” Alphys whispers miserably, and turns back to the phone. 

They all file out, one by one, Sans hanging back. “you’d better go down.” He says, when it’s only him left. “love you. love you all.” Your stomach twists, and you stare as he steps through, before looking down at Frisk as the hole in space repairs itself. 

“C’mon, guys. Let’s go.” You whisper. You don’t want to leave. You want to stay upstairs and watch, but…

God, you wanted that thick door between them and Frisk so much more. 

You’re down to the first floor, and you’re ushering Alphys and Frisk into the basement, getting ready to lock the door from the inside, when you curse, realizing that you’re a goddamn idiot. 

“What?” Alphys gasps. 

“Ghost.” You whisper, and Alphys and Frisk both grimace. 

“Uh, I-I think you should go d-down-”

“Not without my cat.” You say firmly, squelching down the panic in your chest. “He’s kept me alive this long, I owe him this much.” You nod at the door, your stomach twisting again. “Go down. Lock the door. You don’t open it for anybody but me or our friends, understand?” You order Alphys. “I need you to keep an eye on Frisk.” 

“I-I really don’t think…” She pauses, then sees the look in your eyes. “Kay. Okay. God. Okay. C’mon, Frisk.” She tugs Frisk’s hand, and Frisk watches you reluctantly until they stumble and right themselves, teetering on the top stair. 

“I’ll be two minutes. Just hang out down there.” You urge, and Alphys slowly, apprehensively, closes the door, the phone still clamped to her ear as she waits for instructions from the police. 

Damn. Shit. Now it’s just you. 

“Ghost!” You call, trying to keep the fright out of your voice. Maybe fright would be good, you think, walking into the TV room and trying to stay out of sight of the windows. Maybe fright would send him hiding into a space neither you nor any racist… speciesist? Why not both? Anyway, anywhere that any assholes would find him. 

But, no, there the little butthole is, snoozing in front of the fire like nothing’s going on. And, of course, in his mind, nothing _is_ going on. 

“Hey.” You coo, ducking down, trying to stay out of sight. “There you are, buddy. C’mon, cutie. Let’s get out of here.” You scoop him up quickly, holding him to your chest. He yowls, unhappy at this sudden turn of events. Then…

Well, then, everything goes right to hell. 

The power goes. There’s a sound, a hum slowly descending, as all the lights in the house flicker off, the christmas tree fades into darkness, and you’re faced with total and complete silence. You’ve grown used to the buzz of appliances, the hum of the huge house. You don’t know if you’ve ever heard it this quiet. 

Then:

Vvvvvrpt. It’s the sound of something tearing, and then shhhk, the sound of something sliding. You know the latter, it’s a window opening. But you have lasers, you think desperately, you have goddamn lasers to stop this from happening… 

Which only work if they have power. 

There’s a set of footsteps now, soft and steady and practiced, padding through your house confidently. You think inexorably of how Lawyerpants, just the other day, had strode through your house with his cat-born confidence. Now, here you are, instinctively ducking behind the clawfoot recliner, Ghost squeezed tightly to your chest. He’s given up on fighting, perhaps sensing your panic; even he knows when it’s time to stay quiet. 

The footsteps grow louder, and louder, until they’re in the room with you. 

A nasty male laugh splits the air. 

“No use hiding, little bitch. I know you’re in here. I can see your feet behind that chair. Stand up!” He barks. You don’t move, and he laughs again. “Stand up or I see if monster lovers bleed as red as real humans.” 

You grit your teeth, and stand. 

He’s got to be your age, maybe a little older. He’s wearing all black, trying to look intimidating, but he’s slight, scrawny even. His acne stands out red against his chalk white face. He looks… He looks a little nervous. He’s holding a gun, a shiny, black thing, pointed right at you and Ghost, and for a second, it seems like he doesn’t have the right thing to say; his mouth hangs open as he watches you, and you watch him, and Ghost dangles, limp, from your arms.

“Where’s the kid?” He finally asks.

“Gone.” You lie instantly. “Second we saw you, kid took off. We saw you coming. Miles away. Police know. They’re coming. You won’t get away with this. Leave now, maybe you won’t get caught.” Your throat is thick with panic, you feel like you can’t get enough breath, but the lies flow so easy. 

“We won’t get away with this? You freaks stole a kid! We know all about it!” He hisses. “You stole a kid and pretended it belonged to you! Monsters don’t love humans, they kill them! Who knows what awful shit those freaks did, and you?! You’re worse! You sit back and let them do it, you cunt!” He gives you an awful sickly smile. “I know what they do. I watch the news. I’m informed. And you just betray us all because you can’t get a good human man. You deserve to be put down.” He licks his lips slowly, his gun quivering. “You’re not human, if you’re with them.” He rasps, caressing the trigger, and you feel your body begin to shake, almost uncontrollably. You need to be out. 

You can’t be here right now. 

You need a way out. 

“Yeah.” He’s breathing, muttering to himself, his eyes wild. “I shoot the bitch, I send a message. Kid’s here somewhere, I know it. Plenty of time, after I shoot her. They said not to shoot, but…” He points his gun more firmly at your chest, seeming to gain some resolve. “They don’t know everything.” He hisses to himself, and you clutch Ghost closer to your chest with your left hand, your brow furrowing. You need out. You need an escape. You can’t be here any longer. Oh, god, this isn’t how you die, stuck behind the armchair with your cat and a cousin that needs protecting and a man who says he loves you fighting a whole horde out in the snow. No. You’re determined, still shaking wildly. This isn’t how it goes down. 

Your vision flashes blue. 

You move your arm, and a tear, a jagged, horrible tear appears in the air between you and your assailant. You know what you’re doing, even as you spilt the universe apart. There are molecules and molecules and molecules, and you know them all, and it take so little work, the space between them is so light, it takes nothing at all! to fold them, like tissue paper, to tear a hole. You move your hand like it’s the most natural thing like you’ve done it a thousand times. It’s not perfect, not like Sans’. It’s ragged, and scary but still… You know that tear. You love that tear. 

Your mind clouded, still clutching Ghost, you lunge forward, leaping over the armchair with nothing in your mind but bolting through that hole. There’s a bang, an explosion of something, but you’re through, nothing hits you, you’ve made it…

Then you’re dropping. 

You’d never learned how to pinpoint where you wanted to come out, you think frantically, you’d never learned any of this, you had never thought, the day that the skeleton sat down next to you at the vet, that you’d be using magic, that you’d be tearing holes in space time like you were poking your finger through a wet napkin! 

You register, very quickly, that you are very, very high up, that the twinkling lights beneath you are the mansion; so, so far beneath you. 

Your right hand shoots out, your left still clutching Ghost to you - Ghost is holding on just as hard, his claws digging into your skin at four distinct points as he clings - your right hand fumbles, and then snags, your forearm snags on-

oh. 

It’s the edge of reality. It’s nothingness. It’s nothing a human being was ever meant to touch, and you scream as the sensation begins to pulse through your arm, pure entropy, entropy, a thousand molecules losing interest in each other and wandering away, a hundred thousand, a million…

You still dangle, hundreds of feet up in the air, clinging to the edge of the tear in space as your arm falls apart, and a strange clicking sound fills your ears, and bone by little tiny bone in your hand, you feel yourself disintegrating.

This is, you think, resigned, a significantly worse way to die. 

Suddenly, the clicking sound in your ear comes into such sharp focus that you scream again, everything zeroing in to one point. 

(oh, this won’t do.) The clicking announces, and suddenly the pain, the buzzing in your arm is over. It feels almost like a very strong arm is holding yours, keeping you in place. (oh, dear.) The voice sighs. (let’s put you down.) It shoves you, suddenly, and you lose control entirely as you’re forcibly ejected from that tear you made - you see it seal up as you topple down, curling on your back around Ghost, thinking that the very least you could do is save your cat and - 

Whumpf. 

You’ve landed in a deep pile of snow, much too quickly - you should have been falling for so long! But now here you are, in your backyard, feeling no more winded than if you’d fallen five feet. You sit up, and Ghost screams, and you try to place yourself.

“________!” Papyrus shrieks, dashing over to you almost immediately. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING OUT HERE, WE ONLY JUST-”

“Paps! Inside! Bad guy! Frisk!” You bark, not sure how much time has gone past. Papyrus stares at you for a long second, then tears off towards the house, taking such long leaps that he might as well have teleported. You sit up, thankful for the snow poff you landed on, and look around. 

The monsters have made short work of your assailants, you realize, looking at all the people, bound with magical ties, that are forming a large pile against the rock fence separating you from the beach. Most look unconscious but some are awake and swearing, and one or two are staring at you with true hatred. There’s a small scuffle going on, one or two remaining, but Asgore bellows, sweeping his trident, and then Sans is behind them, and there’s a flash, and then they’re on top of the pile, the latest additions to the pyramid of bound miscreants. 

“GOT HIM!” Papyrus bellows from inside the house, as the lights flicker back on behind you, and a moment later, the tall skeleton is hauling your chalk white, stunned assailant - now sporting a rather large stain on his pants - past you to the pile. Good. You let out a soft, shocked laugh, leaning back in the snow in your pretty Christmas dress, your cat still clinging to you, and try to catch your breath. 

You’re alive. 

You’re okay.

Everyone’s okay. 

“___________!” Sans bellows, and there’s the soft sound of feet in the snow as he practically flies towards you. “why are you… are you okay? what happened in there? are you…” He stops short, practically flinging snow towards you as he gets near, and then steps carefully closer, the light in his eyes wild. “what happened?” He whispers.

“They got in. I went to get Ghost. Got caught.” You breathe. “I made a door or something? I don’t… I got away. I don’t know. I’m fine.”

“you’re not fine.” He says blackly. 

“I swear to god, I am, I just-”

“________. your arm.” He breathes, barely making a sound, and you suddenly realize where his eyes are focused. 

With no small amount of trepidation, you look down. 

Your left arm is cradling Ghost to you, the same as it always has. Your right arm, however, it’s holding Ghost too, but it…  
There’s a line, halfway up your forearm. It’s a clean delineation, of how much you managed to throw through that rip in time, to keep you from falling to your death. On one side, your elbow, your upper arm, it’s the same as it always was. And then… it’s like there’s an impossibly thin disc, a slice of a color too dark to see, too thin to see, and on the other side it’s just bones.

You can see them, your radius, your ulna, the hundred tiny bones that make up your wrist and fingers and thumb. You cry out in surprised horror, flinching, and the bones flinch with you, clenching up like nothing is different, like all your tendons and muscles and everything else that makes a human arm work are still there. Sans jumps slightly, and stares at you.

There’s another soft crunching as Undyne comes up towards you two, a shiny, wet slick of blood on her face. 

“Ah!” She yelps, seeing your arm. “Oh, jeez! Is that-”

“at least one of em got in.” Sans says quickly. “sweep inside, undyne.” 

“But-”

“please.” Sans whispers, and Undyne grimaces and nods sharply. 

“You’re gonna be okay.” She whispers, addressing you, or maybe your skeletal arm, before she disappears, and Sans falls on his knees and very carefully picks up your bones in his own, and each sensation is as sharp and raw as if he was touching the worst sunburn of your life. 

You’re gonna be okay, you tell yourself. 

You’re gonna be okay.


	45. In Which Everyone Reacts Very Rationally

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gotta say, pretty thrilled that [Ona](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5053684) and I both dropped bombs last night. Today has been...
> 
> Well, we gloated a little bit. 
> 
> This fandom is GREAT. 
> 
> You all are GREAT. 
> 
> Here is some FANART:
> 
> [I am pretty sure this counts as fanart. it's definitely art.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138123487516/you-did-this-to-me-you-did-this-to-us-all)
> 
> [SKARM](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138095082736/elijahfeathers-what-has-my-life-even-come-to)

“toriel!” Sans’ voice is hoarse and desperate. “toriel, c’mere!” You can’t tear your eyes away from your arm. 

“Sans, put it down, it hurts.” You whimper, and he immediately complies, easing your arm carefully back onto your chest. You wrap it around Ghost, who’s a fuzzy ball of panic trying to cling to you with every little muscle he has, and close your eyes, trying to focus. 

You can still feel each individual piece of fur on his back. Your arm is so sensitive, you can hardly believe it, but…

“I shouldn’t be able to feel.” You mutter, sounding detached even to your own ears. “Don’t have nerves. Nerves took off with everything else.”

“what happened?” He whispers. “how did they do this-”

“They didn’t.” You breathe. “It was me. I did it. I opened a door.”

“you what?-”

“I’m here.” Toriel says, panting slightly. “Sans, the police are - oh, dear.” She blinks, looking at your arm. 

“fix her.” Sans demands. Toriel stares for a second.

“Sans, this is beyond-”

“ _fix her._ ” He hisses tightly, holding very still. Toriel glowers at him. 

“I know you’re upset.” She says, very, very calm. “But this is not the place.” She leans over you, and picks you up as easily as you’d picked up Ghost earlier. Her fur is warm against your cheek and around your bare arms - was the skeleton part cold from the snow? It was. How strange. 

“what are you doing!?” Sans growls. 

“I’m taking her inside.” Toriel says, still absolutely composed. “You may come if you wish, or you may assist Asgore with the human police, but you are _not_ to do anything that will hurt my niece. That means that you aren’t going to do anything stupid. Understand?” She waits for a second, and you close your eyes. You’re just so tired. 

“fine. coming with you.” Sans mutters, and follows Toriel inside as you try to stay awake. 

You don’t manage it for very long. The next thing you know, you’re stretched out on your bed, and Toriel is kneeling by your side, and Ghost is practically glued to your other side, and Sans is pacing by the door, his eyes frantic. 

“c’mon, you gotta be able to do something.” He’s hissing. She gives him a sharp look. 

“I can no more restore her arm then I could sew flesh and bone onto you, Sans.” She says. “Surely you recognize the origins of this magic. This isn’t normal monster magic damage that I can repair. The only people I’ve never known to wield anything like this are you, your brother, and Dr. Gaster.”

“fuck.” He snarls, glaring at the ground and looking miserable. 

“Hey.” You breathe, and both of them jump slightly, looking up at you. “Not his fault.” You manage, feeling annoyed that they’ve both come to this conclusion. “It was an emergency. Instinct. Was gonna get shot.” You insist. 

“shh.” He’s next to Toriel in an instant. “you gotta rest, okay?”

“It wasn’t your fault.” You articulate clearly again. “Some guy broke in and had a gun. He was gonna shoot me and Ghost and try to steal Frisk. He took the shot, but I made a door. Like you. Stepped through.” Toriel gasps, but Sans speaks first. 

“how-”

“Dunno.” You manage. “But I messed up. Made it way too high, the other side, I mean. I thought I was gonna fall a few hundred feet and die so I… I held onto the edge with my arm. God, I’m sore.”

“you held onto the edge.” He whispers. “oh… fuck.”

“What does that mean?” Toriel breathes, and Sans shudders.

“it means she had to feel her arm falling apart.” He says blackly. “means she felt every single atom suddenly forget how to be an arm. she held onto the void, tori. the entire damn void, all at once, flattened into the fabric between two spaces, and she held onto it.” He takes a breath, staring at you. “doesn’t make sense, though. you should be … gone, by now. it should have started breaking down the rest of your body. why are you okay?”

“Don’t know.” You mutter. “Something grabbed my arm, and it stopped hurting. It was something… I don’t know. Weird. Spoke in noises like... clicking and crunching. It hurt my head. But it got me safe down.” You manage, looking around hopefully for a glass of water. Your mouth is so dry. “Don’t know how. But it did.” 

“something grabbed you?” Sans says, sounding astonished. “someone spoke to you?” He peers closer at your arm, too afraid to touch it again, and you lean up a little and look at it too. There’s that perfectly clean spot, a few inches from your elbow, where your flesh and blood start up again, and the delineation point, where you expect to be able to see a cross section of flesh and blood and vein and tendon, it’s just… black. Darker than black. It seems to draw in the light and refuse to let anything out, and it’s just slapped on your arm, your bones jutting out in an unsettling contrast. Sans swallows roughly. “i’ve seen that color before.” He whispers. “he saved you.”

“Who?” Toriel asks, her sweet face looking upset. “What are you talking about?” You shake your head slightly. You understand now. 

“His dad. The old scientist. Right?” You say, looking at Sans. “You said he went deeper than anyone could go, in space, but…”

“that color.” He says with a slow, cautious nod. “that’s what the place he stepped into looked like. he held you together. he saved your life.” He says, his voice cracking. “don’t know how the bastard did it, but… he saved you.”

“Is that why I can still…” You pause to yawn, your eyelids drooping unwillingly again. “Can still feel stuff? Can still move my hand? What’s holding it together?” Sans lets out a very strange laugh. 

“the guy knows his damn skeletons.” He mutters, and the three of you think about that for a long moment. 

“What am I?” You finally ask. 

“human.” Sans answers, before Toriel can. “mostly.” Like Sans is a monster, mostly, you think, and marvel at the fact that such a thought could actually feel soothing. 

“Is everyone okay?” You finally think to ask. 

“Of course.” Toriel sighs. “There were only fifty-three of them.”

“fifty four. one in the house.” Sans points out. 

“Still. The odds were easy.” She whispers. “The king is dealing with your law enforcement right now.” She reaches out and strokes your hair fondly. “You need to rest.” She tells you again, and you try to find the right words to argue. How can you possibly sleep with half your damn arm missing? Yet, your eyelids are drooping again, and you turn on your side, holding your arm rather protectively in front of you, to try your hardest. 

“Sans?” You whisper. 

“right here. staying.” He assures you. “s’okay, tori, find frisk, give ‘em a hug for me.” 

“You’re sure?”

“i’ll call if there’s any trouble.” He assures her, kicking off his muddy sneakers and climbing up on the other side of the bed. He’s reaching over you to turn off the light, but you shake your head. 

“Nnn.” 

“k. light on.” He whispers, and settles down next to you, Ghost sandwiched between the two of you. You close your eyes for a second, then, almost unconsciously, reach behind you. Your fingers - bones, you think quickly - feel much too sensitive as they bump against his wrist, but you find his hand the same and pull his arm around your waist, feeling relieved when you can release his hand and the sensation stops. He’s frozen for a moment, before he makes a soft, despairing noise and curls up tightly to you - Ghost meows irritably and stalks out of the way to sit by your feet. “‘m so sorry.” He whispers. 

“Shhh.” You mumble. 

“shoulda stayed with you.” 

“Couldn’t have. Put everyone at risk.” You assure him, and he pulls closer still, until he’s perfectly nestled against you. 

“try to sleep.” He says, and you nod slowly. 

“Love you.” You whisper, your hand twitching painfully.

“love you too.” He sounds broken, and you try not to dwell on it too terribly as you let exhaustion claim you once again.   
\------------------------------------

You’re falling apart. Every single cell is giving up, wandering away, turning to dust and blowing off you or dripping off like sludge, soaking into the mattress. You try to scream, but your mouth is already too far gone, you can’t feel your tongue, your lungs will barely hold air, and your eyes are dimming and-

“hey! hey! s’ok. you’re ok.” 

You gulp in a deep lungful of air, feeling the tears streaming from your eyes already, and scramble upright, your back against the headboard, looking yourself over. Two legs, torso, two arms - kinda. You’re here. 

Kinda. 

Sans is looking anxiously at you - he doesn’t look great, you can see that now.

“ok?”

“Nightmare.” You gasp, feeling freezing with sweat. “God. Oh god.”

“you’re fine.” He whispers, sitting up next to you. “almost made it through the night.”

“What time is it?” 

“early.” 

“Did you sleep?” You ask, and he makes a face that’s answer enough. “Sans.” You sigh. “You should have slept.” 

“someone needed to keep an eye on you. i had to make sure…” He sighs, then takes a deep breath. “no changes.” He assures you, and you look down at your arm again - you keep vacillating wildly between wanting to stare at it and having no interest whatsoever in looking at it ever again. He’s right. There’s no change, other than the dull throb having receded from it. You lift your skeletal hand up, and brush some hair out of your eyes dubiously - it no longer stings. It feels natural. 

You aren’t sure how you feel about that. 

“I need a shower.” You whisper. “Different clothes. I feel disgusting” 

“how about a bath?” He bargains. “less standing.” You blink at him. 

“Um, my legs are still pretty much the same, think I can stand.” You say, “Unless… um, do you think I can get it wet?” He laughs in spite of himself, then looks guilty.

“yeah. you can get it wet.” He assures you. “i mean, i’ve never had the alternative, but i assume that it’s pretty much the same as your old hand in terms of what it can do. well… ring shopping might be tough.” He drawls, and you roll your eyes at him. 

“I’m taking a shower. Are you coming, or would you rather sit here and make jokes?” 

“coming!” He says, standing up quickly. “does, um, do your bones still hurt?” He asks, as you push out of bed yourself. You grimace. 

“Not so bad.” You mutter, flexing your hand again and looking down at it. “Oh, weird. It’s so see-through.” You murmur, seeing the floor through the fine bones in your palm. He blinks. 

“yeah, i guess that would be weird.” He says, mostly to himself. You give him a tiny smile. 

“This must be really bizarre for you, huh?” You point out, and he laughs. 

“um. nah. this stuff i guess… i’m used to it. i mean, void stuff, bone stuff obviously. gotta be weirder for you, i’m sure.” Well, he’s probably not wrong there. 

He helps you undress - you can’t for the life of you get the zipper in the back of the stupid dress you’re still wearing, which makes you feel awfully helpless; the smooth metal just slips between your fingers. 

“you’ll get the hang of it. gotta imagine you have fingers that can grab it.” He advises. 

“I’m not sure I can do that, what you can do.”

“if you couldn’t, i don’t think you’d be all in one piece right now. your brain’s still holding you together and telling your bones to move, babe.” He coaches you quietly, and you try not to feel strange about the fact that he’s undressing you as he’s doing so. 

“I guess…” You whisper, shivering again, and manage your underwear yourself before quickly bolting into the shower, feeling a little silly that you’d tried to wear cute lingerie for him, all things considered. The hot water is a godsend, and for a moment, you just close your eyes and feel the heat soak into you - the drops are a little much, still, on your hand, but they’re not painful at least, you’re just aware of them. The curtain rustles, and Sans awkwardly leans halfway in. 

“um, d’you want me in there, or-”

“Yes, please.” You say quickly, feeling uncertain as to how you’re going to manage holding your shampoo or bodywash or anything. He steps in a second later - heh, no blue glow this time, he looks like something that could be hanging in the corner of a bio classroom, but for the intelligent light in his eyes, studying you. 

“here. hold your hand out.” He offers, and you do so, grimacing again as you see the water dripping through your hand. 

“Ugh, that’s so…” You shudder. He gives you an encouraging smile. 

“tell your hand that it can hold the water.” He says. You frown. “it’s not hard. imagine your old hand there. imagine holding water in your palm.” He mutters. “try closing your eyes.”

“Oh! Like that!” You say, surprised. It’s the same advice Frisk had given you, after all, and you know, now, how to push out with your brain and your soul to see something, so instead, you push - through, you suppose, down your arm to the tips of your fingers. It’s much, much easier than trying to see a soul. One second, you’re just bones, and the next, the water is bouncing off your hand, your forearm, just like it used to, just like it does on your other arm. 

“heh. or the whole arm. that’s good too.” Sans says. You blink at him. 

“I see what you mean. It’s work… it takes effort. Not a lot, but, some effort...” You muse, flexing your hand again, “but it’s not that bad… Oh, thank god.” You suddenly slump with relief, feeling like all of this has caught up with you at once. “Oh, god, I thought I’d just be getting snagged on things forever. I thought I’d hurt…” You whisper, looking at your hand, the pool of water forming on the invisible palm. “This isn’t so bad. It’s not so bad.” You tell yourself. 

“you know, it’s okay to be upset still.” Sans is watching you closely. “it’s a … it’s a big change. you’re allowed to be mad at me.” 

“Sans.” You say sharply. “Please. Don’t. This magic, okay, whatever it is that means I can use it-” He gives you *a look*, and you roll your eyes at him, “it saved my life back there. I was going to get shot with a gun point blank. Humans don’t come back from that.” You whisper. “It’s… it’s gonna take some getting used to, alright, but I’m not mad at you. I’m really, really thankful. Whatever happened saved my life.” You repeat. “And… I’ve got a lot to figure out right now, okay, I can’t do that and have you stuck in some guilty place.” You look seriously at him, then kiss his forehead softly. “I need you to sleep, and eat, and help me feel… normal.” You admit. “I can’t promise I won’t freak out again. I need your help to get through this. Like, very literally. This is new territory for me.” You remind him, and he nods at once. 

“‘course. i’m gonna be there for you.” He insists, looking like he’s desperate to be doing something to help, right this very moment. You smile slowly, the expression feeling strange on your face. 

“Deal.” You whisper, and tentatively reach out to grab the shampoo. This time, your hand grips it easily, no sliding or scrabbling. “Wow.” You murmur, and he smiles at you. 

“you’re a really fast learner.” He tells you, sounding, if anything, a little proud. You look at him again. 

“You’re sure this isn’t weird for you? Like, you’re sure?” You find yourself asking. “Like, you’re not a little upset that your girlfriend’s suddenly pretty… freaky?” You switch hands with your shampoo to wiggle your skeletal fingers. 

“uh.” He glances away, looking awkward, and you feel somewhat vindicated - of course he thinks you’re a freak, everyone will! - before you notice the color in his cheeks. Unwillingly, your eyebrow raises. 

“Sans… do you, um … er, do you like how I look now?” You manage. He lets out a soft groan. 

“i know! i know it’s messed up!” He says pathetically, and seems totally surprised when you step out from under the stream of water to hug him tightly. “you’re not mad-”

“That my boyfriend still thinks I’m cute? No!” You say, quickly. “I mean, that’s one less thing to worry about.” 

“heh. you know, i was totally into you before this, just, uh, for the record.” He points out quickly, and you suddenly realize how weird this is, to be nude and in the shower and this close to your boyfriend while he talks about how attracted he is, and you’ve got a skeleton arm and…

“I think you were right.” You murmur.

“hm?”

“Shoulda gone with the bath. I gotta sit down. This is a lot.” You whisper. He gives you a terribly sweet smile, and reaches around you to fiddle with the controls on the shower, until the water starts coming out of the faucet instead. You sit down quickly, closing the drain with a quick motion - thanks, skeleton hand! - and then begin laughing softly as the water begins to rise around you and you slump back onto his ribcage. 

“what?” He asks, reaching to take the shampoo from you and eyeing it dubiously before beginning to massage it into your scalp. God, that feels so good that you almost forget his question. 

“Just… this is already the weirdest day of my entire life.” You mutter, your eyes closing again. He lets out a low chuckle.

“pretty sure that’s fair, babe.” He points out. 

You’re pretty sure he’s right.


	46. In Which Nobody Thinks Your Arm Is Cool

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THERE IS SOME FANART BOY HOWDY:
> 
> [ The rare imgur link!](http://imgur.com/a/jTCw2)
> 
> [ SKARM CITY ](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138220919806/artanddetermination-fanart-of-the-fanfic-chill)
> 
> [ Bone Thugs-n-Skarmony](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138201852771/ch-44-fanart)
> 
> [THE SKARMENING](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138186622426/submitted-by-invadernids-just-pretend-the)
> 
> [New aesthetic](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138181470171/iambisansexual-quick-sketch-its-chill-or-be)
> 
> [ Glowing eye skarm!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138180422151/submitted-by-poubelle-squelette-iuhdrew-you-a)

The prospect of getting out of the tub is daunting. You’re half asleep again by the time that Sans has rinsed the conditioner from your hair. This whole… arm thing, it’s exhausting, you think.

“Am I always gonna be so tired?” You ask, slumping against him. He shakes his head cautiously. 

“don’t think so. i’m not. well, i am, but i don’t think it’s cuz i’m made of bones.” He says with a laugh. “never seems to make paps tired. nah, i think your body went through a hell of a shock. you need to sleep and eat and sleep some more.” 

“Don’t.. ugh, I don’t want to have that nightmare again.” You mutter. “Don’t want to sleep if it’ll be like that.” He exhales through his teeth. “What?”

“i think if we both try to stay awake to avoid the nightmares, uh, we’ll break down sooner rather than later.” He mutters. “i’ve tried that routine, babe. it, uh, it doesn’t end well.” He says, and you sigh. “i’ll be there, whenever you wake up. every time. promise.” He whispers. 

“Sans, you don’t need to… I’m sure you’ve got other stuff to do.” You argue halfheartedly, and he shakes his head. 

“staying.” He says, so firmly that your heart stutters slightly. For a moment, you don’t have the words. You’re not used to someone taking care of you like this. You’d gotten through every flu, every stomach bug, basically everything on your own, spare Ghost. And now… well, he was staying. 

“Thank you.” You whisper, and his arms pull a little tighter around you, hugging you softly. 

“it’s not a big deal.” He replies with a chuckle, and weirdly, he clearly means that too. “you ready to get out?” 

“Oh. Probably.” You say, thinking about how much work standing will be. He slides carefully out from behind you, and offers you a hand - a very strong hand, of course, since one second you’re sitting, and the next you’re standing, dripping. He passes you a towel quickly. 

“hang tight.” He instructs, and hurries back into your bedroom. A few seconds later, he’s returned with some clothes - oh, god, he’d been in your underwear drawer, that was embarrassing, you think, then promptly remind yourself that he’s seen you naked, so maybe you shouldn’t be all that embarrassed. And the sweatpants and soft cotton t-shirt look so nice right now. He sees you swaying slightly and offers you his shoulder to lean on without being asked. You change as quickly as you can, wincing when you forget to keep projecting the … ugh, the hand? The ghost hand? Well, when you forget to project padding, you decide, around the tender bones of your fingers, you’re surprised by the sudden sensation of the fabric of the pants you’re trying to pull up. You grit your teeth, focus, and project, then finish getting dressed. 

You’ll get used to it, you tell yourself. 

“back in bed?” Sans says hopefully, and you think about that nightmare, shudder, and shake your head. 

“Can we go downstairs? I promise, I’ll nap on the couch, just… I don’t want to be back in bed right now.” You bargain. He squints at you, then nods. 

“lemme take you.” He murmurs, and you wince, thinking about travelling through one of those doorways. He seems to read your mind. “i’ll carry you downstairs.” He assures you. 

You’re too tired to argue, so you nod, and he scoops you up rather easily. You yawn, and try not to fall asleep again while he carries you, but it’s almost impossible; he’s suspiciously comfortable for such a bony guy. Well, you supposed he was making himself deliberately comfortable, which was awfully sweet. You end up not even managing to keep your eyes open all the way down the stairs. You just feel so safe when he holds you like this. 

\---------------------

You’re still snuggled up in his hold, now covered by a blanket, the next time you open your eyes. He’s sitting on the couch, his head tilted back, fast asleep. The sight makes you smile slightly, realizing that he’s managed to relax enough to sleep. You reflexively check your arm, pulling it out from under the covers to stare at it. Oh, there’s nothing different, of course. You don’t know why you expected otherwise. Maybe it’s a little less tender. 

You’re about to close your eyes again when your stomach growls loudly, and you realize why you’re awake. Oof, you’re starving. You don’t want to wake Sans, though, so for a second you hold still, then, painstakingly, inch yourself off his lap. Thank god he sleeps like the dead. He stirs once, grumbling your name, when you move too fast, but you eventually manage to get away. Standing, your head spins slightly. Oh, man, you need food. You pick your way painstakingly into the kitchen, and are greeted by a gasp. 

“_________! You’re up?” Undyne says, jumping. She’s in the process of making a sandwich at the counter, and looks alarmed to see you standing there, framed in the doorway. 

“Uh, yeah.” You say, feeling… awkward. Her eye flicks instantly to your arm and you struggle very hard not to immediately tuck it behind your back. 

“...Man.” She mutters, then looks up at you. 

“Uh.” You clear your throat. “I just need some, uh, toast or something.” You attempt. Your voice sounds strained and unnatural, even to your own ears. You didn’t expect to feel so damn awkward or uncomfortable in front of your friend, but you feel like all she can see right now is your arm, and you’re surprised at how much that seems to sting. “I’ll… get out of your hair.” You whisper halfheartedly. She breathes in sharply, groans, and strides over to you. You barely have a second to think before she’s grabbing you tight, squeezing you and trembling slightly. 

“C’mon. Don’t be like that. You scared the shit out of us, nerd.” She whispers hoarsely. She’s not even making the effort not to cry. “You’re okay?”

“I’m sorry.” You mumble into her shoulder. “I didn’t mean to.. yeah. I’m okay. More or less.” You feel a little better, realizing that much of her initial reaction must have been absolute horror at the prospect of almost losing you. 

She pulls back after a second, and wipes her eye, sniffling a little. “Can I see?” She asks, quieter than you’ve ever heard her before. You grimace; you’re gonna have to get used to this. With trepidation, you hold your arm out. Her eye goes wide, and she examines it for a long moment. 

“Still works?” She asks, and you nod, flexing your hand to demonstrate. “Cool.” She whispers, sounding … envious? She realizes this and quickly shakes her head. “Gosh, sorry.” 

“You… you think it’s cool?” You mutter. She gives you a guilty look. 

“Um. Sorry.” She says quietly, then, when you raise an eyebrow, she gives you a reluctant nod. “It’s so badass.” She says unhappily, clearly thinking that she’s upsetting you. You let out a low chuckle, shaking your head. 

“Sans likes it too.” You tell her. “I think he feels even worse than you about liking it.” Well, to be fair, you’re pretty sure that Sans _really_ likes it. She has to laugh at that.

“Well, yeah, I guess that makes sense. What do you think? I mean, how do you feel about it?” She asks quietly. 

“It’s… weird. It’s so weird.” You mutter. “I’m not used to it. I think it’ll be a long time before it seems normal.” 

“Yeah, know that feeling.” She says dryly, and when you look at her, confused, she pointedly taps her eyepatch. Realization slowly sinks in. God, if anyone knows what it’s like to lose something like this, it’s Undyne! In fact, holy hell, it must be so much worse for Undyne. Your arm looked weird, sure, but it wasn’t… gone. Not the way she’d lost her eyesight...

“I’m an idiot.” You whisper, shaking your head. “I didn’t think-” She gives you a quick, reassuring smile. 

“Hey, see? You didn’t think twice about it. You were totally used to it.” She says. “That’s how everyone’s gonna be with you, too, before you know it. Sure, you’ll get some stares on the street. I get plenty. I mean, I would anyway, I’m a monster in a human city. But… you know what I’m saying, right? It’s not the only thing I think about anymore. Not the first thing I think about in the morning or the last thing in the evening.” 

“Undyne, what… happened?” You ask quietly. She snorts and shakes her head. 

“Bit off a little more magic spear than I could chew in a fight. My fault. Gotta be the only person in the underground to actually take my own eye out with my magic.” She says. 

“Heh. Know the feeling.” You admit. She winces and nods. 

“Well, now we both look super badass.” She offers, and you grin, your smile feeling natural for the first time all day. 

“Damn straight.” You agree, feeling… well, reassured. You can talk to Undyne about this, and she’ll be there for you and understand what’s going on. 

“Want a sandwich?” She changes the topic with a gentle smile (it looks weird on her) and you groan and nod. 

“God, please, I’m so hungry. And water or gatorade or something, I need like a gallon.” You say, hopping up on a barstool. 

“On it.” Undyne is eager to help, and moves very quickly, grabbing you a glass of water and then beginning to construct a second sandwich made of leftovers. The second it’s in front of you, you pick it up with both hands, ignoring how awkward you still are with the right, and begin to eat. 

“Oh my god, this is the best sandwich I’ve ever had.” You groan, your mouth full. Undyne grins, and immediately starts making you another, seeing that it’s not likely that you’ll slow down. 

With food and water in your stomach, you feel so much better. Almost immediately, you feel much more like yourself. You’re just opening your mouth to congratulate Undyne on her engagement, realizing that you’d forgotten the other night, when you’re startled by a loud noise. You’re certainly alert enough to be on your feet and swearing the second you hear Sans’ deep, panicked voice yell out your name. 

“Shit.” You mutter, looking at the door. “I’m in the kitch-” You call out, but he’s already there, bursting into the space next to you through a doorway, his eyes wild. “Hey! Hey. I’m okay. Just getting some food.” You assure him quickly. He takes a deep breath, looking at you, and the doorway behind him seals with a snap. 

“...jeez.” He mutters, catching his breath, then takes both of your hands, clearly not really thinking, and kisses you fiercely, like it would kill him to let go. You… well, you immediately forget that Undyne’s in the room. You lean into him, at first just trying to reassure him, and are surprised by the desire building somewhere deep inside you at this contact; you hadn’t had room in your head to feel anything like this in the morning, but now, god, your head is swimming with how much you love this man…

Undyne makes a small sound accidentally as she turns away to do some dishes, clearly trying to give you some privacy, and you remember yourself. Pulling away from Sans, just a little, it’s your turn to catch your breath. “Heh. Sorry. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“s’okay.” He mutters, flushing, and you wonder if his mind had wandered down the same path yours just had. Maybe. His bony fingers are still twined through your own, and at last, it doesn’t hurt. In fact, it feels pretty…

It feels right? 

“just didn’t expect you not to be there.” He’s saying quietly. You make an apologetic face. 

“Yeah. Sorry. I was starving. Undyne made me a sandwich.”

“Sandwiches. She had four, dude.” Undyne chimes in, turning to grin at you, and you roll your eyes. 

“Sandwiches. Don’t tattle.” You grumble, and Sans grins. 

“glad you ate. you sound so much better.” He says happily, and you nod. 

“I’m feeling so much better. Thanks to you guys.” You say, and then jump as Asgore comes striding in, eyes hard. 

“Sans, is she alright? Oh! _______! You’re up!” His eyes dart to your arm. Yup, this is going to become routine. 

“I’m fine.” You assure him. “Thanks so much for… everything, Asgore.” You’ve been bottling that thought up. “You really came through last night. What happened, after I…” He heaves a sigh, still looking at your hand in Sans’ for a moment. 

“The police officers came to collect the aggressors. Unfortunately, quite a few of them have already posted bail. They’re being watched, apparently. Mettaton needed to turn over his memory of the fight as evidence, but since you’re a human and you invited us onto your property, given the circumstances, Lawyerpants says that it’s very unlikely that they’ll succeed in pressing any charges against us.” 

“Gosh. I didn’t even think that was a possibility.” You admit, then scowl. “Oh, hell, so some of them are already out? They could come back?” You whisper.

“not likely.” Sans says darkly. “can’t see ‘em lining up for seconds.” You glance at him, wondering just how short of “not killing them” he’d come, and then think about the boy with the gun who had tried to kill you and Ghost, and wanted to steal Frisk, and suddenly, you can’t bring yourself to care if any of the humans got a few broken bones or whatever. Sans has a wide, false smile on his face, and you’re not sure if you like it, but when you squeeze his hand, he looks back at you, his expression gentle once more. 

“Well, again, thanks so much, Asgore.” You whisper. “Last night could have gone a hell of a lot worse. How’s Frisk?” 

“Frantic to see you.” Asgore says with a laugh. “Are you up for more company?”

“Definitely. I’ll find ‘em.” You say, untangling your hand clumsily from Sans’. He looks at you. 

“babe-”

“I just need to stretch my legs.” You explain softly, cutting off his protest. “I’ll be okay. I’m feeling a lot stronger. I’ll sleep some more after. You probably should too.” 

“well, let me come with. they’re up in frisk’s room playing, i think.” You wonder vaguely when he’s going to feel comfortable letting you out of his sight. 

“Sure.” You agree. “Let’s go up now, before I get tired again.” 

Every sore muscle screams on the stairs getting you up to the third floor, and you can hear the excited chatter of Papyrus from the second floor landing. As you grow closer, you hear the occasional spike of Frisk’s playful speech in your brain as well. They’re playing with Papyrus’ action figures. You pause outside the door to Frisk’s bedroom, which is cracked open, and knock carefully, wincing at the strange, hollow sound of bones on wood. A second later, Papyrus is flinging the door open. 

“HUMAN! YOU’RE AWAKE!” He says, delighted. “WE THOUGHT YOU WOULD SLEEP FOREVER!” He steps aside, staring at your arm with starry eyes. “LOOK AT YOUR AWESOME BATTLE ARM!”

“...Battle arm? Oof!” The wind is practically knocked out of you as Frisk comes sprinting over and hugs you tightly. “Hey kiddo.” You whisper. “You okay?” 

“ **I’m so sorry it was my fault I’m so sorry I heard Alphys tell Mom that she heard him and you were trying to protect me I’m so sorry this is all my fault-** ” Frisk babbles frantically, still holding tight to you. You take a deep breath, and drop to your knees to lock eyes with Frisk. 

“This wasn’t your fault, Frisk. The only person whose fault it was was the guy who broke in the house.” You whisper. “That’s all.”

“ **They were looking for me. They wanted to take me. Why did they want to take me?** ” Frisk asks you. “ **Nobody will tell me anything.** ” They look so upset, practically on the verge of tears, that you reach out to stroke their hair, skeletal fingers sliding through their neat bob. 

“we don’t know, kid. but we’re not gonna let anyone take you anywhere.” Sans says firmly. “me and paps and your mom and dad and undyne and alphys and mettaton… and your cousin, too. we’re all pretty tough. we’re never gonna let anyone hurt you again.” Frisk gives him a distant, strange look, remembering _something_ , but then they glance at you and nod. 

“ **Everything’s different up here.** ” They tell themselves quietly, then look up. “ **Can I see your arm, _______?!** ” They sound so excited, that you nearly get whiplash from the sudden change in mood. 

“hey, frisk, buddy, it’s still a little new for _______, maybe-”

“Nah. It’s cool.” You tell Sans with a small smile. “What do you think, bud?” You hold out your arm, and Frisk squints at it. 

“ **It’s SO. AWESOME.** ” They say reverently, and in your head, you can tell that they mean it. 

“NYEH! IT WOULD BE COOLER IF SHE GOT TO BE ALL SKELETON LIKE THE GREAT PAPYRUS, BUT THIS IS CERTAINLY AN UPGRADE!” Papyrus has been itching to chime in, and he grins at you. You roll your eyes, but you have to admit… well, you didn’t really think that Frisk would go running, screaming from you or anything. Not really. Well, maybe a little. 

“paps.” Sans is saying warningly. You surprise yourself by chuckling, shaking your head. 

“Man, I love you guys. Thanks, Frisk. And Paps, I guess.” You say with another laugh. “I kinda thought everyone would freak out.” 

“uh, we sort of got that out of our system while you were sleeping.” Sans mutters, and you’re mildly thankful that you’d missed that panic. “speaking of which, babe, you wanna try and get a few more hours?”

“YOU SHOULD REST, HUMAN, YOUR ARM _DID_ GO MISSING!” Papyrus frets. 

“Okay.” You agree, though you’re not exactly feeling sleepy right now. You’re feeling pretty damn strong. But…

Well, the prospect of a few hours of private time with Sans is tempting, you think, not a little guiltily. It’s been hitting you in waves, all day, how lucky you are to be alive. Right now, you want nothing more than to be alive with him. 

Sans offers you a hand up once more, and something in your expression makes him blush again. He looks you over for a second, and you get the sense that he’s managing to hide a smirk as he firmly tells Frisk and Papyrus, 

“you guys still gotta let her sleep, okay?” They both nod, guiltily, but when he takes your hand and strolls at your side down the stairs again, you suspect that sleep might very well be the last thing on his mind.


	47. In Which Sans Demonstrates That He Is A Veritable Master of Tact

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:  
> [Papyrus' POV during the Chapter 44 fight](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5846080)
> 
> Probably read that first!
> 
> I have totally lost track of which fanart I've posted because I am a poopie, so um, here's [one I know I haven't](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138268545001/flurry-blue-umm-i-thought-it-was-too-cute-for) and check the chill or be chilled fanart tag on my [tumblr](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com) to stay up to date on all the latest fan art, or as I am now abbreviating it, fart. 
> 
> :D

It takes you perhaps a second, maybe two, once you’re in your room, to pull Sans to you and kiss him forcefully. He doesn’t seem to be complaining. Quite the contrary, his arms twist around you and one hand knots in your hair, his tongue demanding entrance to your mouth, which you willingly and immediately yield. When he leans away, he’s breathing hard. 

“thought i was gonna lose you last night.” He whispers roughly. “you’re still okay. you’re really okay?”

“Yeah. I’m okay.” You assure him, fumbling with the hem of his shirt. Your mind is rather set on getting him undressed again. You have to admit, now that you’re getting … slightly more accustomed to the fact that half of your right arm is just bones and magic, you’re more than a little curious about, uh, all the parts of his body that don’t glow in the dark. And it was daytime, anyway, and you hadn’t really had a proper look, all things considered, and-

“you’re sure you don’t need to sleep?” His hand has slid rather dangerously far down your back, and you can tell he’s struggling to behave right now. “you probably should sleep, you’ve been through a hell of a lot-”

“I don’t want to sleep.” You say clearly, feeling almost mulishly stubborn. You probably could sleep, when it comes down to it, but this is way more important. “I’m still alive. I want to be alive right now.” He groans softly at that, then growls deep in his chest when you have the audacity to lean forward and nibble at one of the bones of his neck. He forgets his composure entirely, grabbing your butt with a greedy hand, and you have to try hard not to feel like you’re getting away with something as he does so. 

“thought i’d lost you.” He mutters again. “was so busy trying to keep you… no. not busy. i was angry.” You shiver at his tone, but it’s not at all an unpleasant shiver. “they were coming to hurt you.” He whispers hoarsely. “i wanted to hurt them. i wanted to teach them a goddamn lesson. nobody gets to hurt you. you or frisk. it felt so good to finally do something. felt so good to stop waiting for the other shoe to fall. lost control. wasn’t… i shoulda been watching the house.” He sounds so contrite, but he can’t stop gripping you, holding you so close that you can barely string two thoughts together. 

“You didn’t know.” You point out, breathing hard. He shakes his head. 

“you haven’t played that game yet. the ‘what ifs.’” He mutters. “if i hadn’t been having so much fun… god, it just felt so… justified.” He says, and falls still as you pull his shirt off him - well, not entirely still, he moves enough to get the job done. “i shoulda stayed with you. there was more than enough of us to take ‘em all down. it was so easy.” He breathes, once he’s free of the t-shirt. You shake your head. 

“You can’t play that game. Not up here.” You say, guessing where his worry starts. “We’ve only got one shot to make a decision up here, Sans. No Groundhog Day. No…” _Resets,_ the word settles comfortably into your head, and since you don’t quite understand it, you don’t dare say it out loud. “I survived. I still have you. I still have all of you, everyone.” You whisper. “I wasn’t ready to die, and I…” You trail off, suddenly wanting nothing more than to be closer to him, as close as possible. 

“i know. too stubborn to die.” He says, reverently, and lets his other hand slide down the back of your pants, bones against bare skin. You gasp, feeling privately satisfied that he’s on the same page as you, and cautiously run your sensitive, raw fingers over his ribcage. He shudders. “god, babe, you’ve got some strong… that’s some strong magic.” He hisses, and you blink. 

“I’m just borrowing it.” You point out, and he shakes his head. 

“that’s not my magic. not… entirely, anyway.” He says, panting. “i know what mine feels like.” You have to stop for a second to think about that. 

“...Humans don’t have magic, Sans.” You point out softly, and he shakes his head. 

“humans used to. frisk does. you do.” He says, tolerating your sudden distraction admirably, all things considered. You bite your lip, thinking, and he watches you bite your lip, his tongue glowing rather obscenely as he admires you, panting - oh, you can’t think about that right now. Right, of course. Frisk could see souls, Frisk could communicate with their soul, and … well, Frisk had somehow survived fighting nearly all these monsters, all these friends of yours that had taken fifty-four men down like it was barely even work. And Frisk sure as hell didn’t have the same excuse for their abilities as you’d been forming for yours. 

“Huh.” You mutter, thinking about that, then moan when he grabs your butt a little tighter, almost immediately losing your train of thought. He’s inching you backwards without you even really noticing, the bed his clear goal now that you’re aware of it, but this time you don’t want to be a helpless puddle of human that can only reciprocate. You gather your willpower and nudge him pointedly, and he grunts. “Lie down.” You demand, and he takes a breath, then obeys, though not without pushing your pants and panties down first. You let out a soft laugh at his behavior - oh, he’d listen to you, you got the sense he’d do whatever you wanted, but submissive he most certainly was not - and straddle him quickly, feeling a little silly that you’re both half dressed (opposite halves, which was probably for the best, since you could already feel him straining beneath you and you weren’t entirely sure of your willpower). 

Grinding softly against him, you lean down to kiss a rib softly, just above where you know his soul to be. He makes a soft noise, threading his hands through your hair, which is nearly reward enough. Encouraged, you run your tongue along another rib, enjoying the smooth sensation. “Does that feel good?” You whisper. He nods quickly, then, awfully shyly, he mutters, 

“can i show you?” You almost shake your head no - he always finds a way to make it his turn to please you! - but something in his eyes makes it clear that he wants this. 

“Okay.” You say, feeling a little nervous, and carefully, reluctantly, climb off him, stretching out next to him. He smiles, a little anxiously, and has your shirt and bra off in a heartbeat, faster than you could have thought possible (fast enough that you suspect some time manipulation is at play), and just like that, he’s poised over you, a skeleton wearing nothing but black jogging shorts and a hungry expression. 

He leans down, and you expect him to lathe his tongue over your ribs, or your breasts (he certainly liked those), but when his fingers form a circle around your right wrist, you whimper, realizing his intention. He immediately freezes. “too much?” He asks, and you have to gather your willpower in order to shake your head no. 

“Try.” You finally utter, when you realize he’s waiting for you to form words, and he nods slowly, carefully lifting your skeletal hand to his mouth. He kisses your palm softly, and you shudder, your eyes screwing shut. 

“too much?” He asks again quickly. 

“No. No. Just… a lot.” You breathe hoarsely. He hesitates, watching you, and then you feel his tongue against your wrist and yelp, then giggle wildly before slapping your free hand to your mouth, realizing how loud you’re being. He gives you a look that, on any other day, would surely have been a smirk. Today, it’s awfully tender. His teeth and tongue scrape the fine bones of your wrist again, and you curse quietly, still trying not to moan or giggle, and then you give up entirely when he moves a little lower, and that magic tongue slides, god, between - oh, it’s between your bones, that’s so…

“shhh!” He stops what he’s doing to laugh, looking entirely mollified right now, and you try your best to scowl at him, your chest still heaving, and you tear your arm away to slip into the waistband of his shorts, wrapping your bones around the part of him that’s been pressing against your lower stomach this whole time, and suddenly, wonderfully, he’s not laughing any longer, his eyes blissful and vacant, his tongue dragging lazy lines on your neck as you try to cope with the magic surging up your tender new arm, breathing hard and trying to cope with the sensation of a thousand fireworks in your bones, your free hand twined through his ribs again, until he grunts and mutters, “i need you,” and well, after that, you let him have you. He sounds urgent, after all.

He is urgent. 

And you’re still alive, and… and they can’t take this away. 

Afterwards, when you’re little more than a panting mess of satisfaction, feeling absolutely… uh, god, there had to be a better word then ‘filled,’ right? Ugh, fine, filled with magic, the sensation growing more familiar but no less pleasant - god, he’d finished this time, you’d thought, then he’d dragged his fingers across your face, whispered your name and started right back up again - okay. Okay. Breathe. Calm down. What were you thinking? You’d definitely had a thought going just then, beyond being so utterly satisfied that thoughts just weren’t coming.

“You’re amazing.” You finally manage. He’s still catching his breath, his fingers tight in your hair still, staring at the ceiling.

“god. i love you. you too. fuck, you’re great!” He whispers reverently, and a companionable silence fills the room for a while, as he strokes your hair and you lean against him, feeling like nothing could possibly be wrong right now. Fuck dying. Fuck getting shot. Fuck losing a good half of your arm. He loved you and you loved him, and that was all that mattered. 

Until he speaks again. “but. uh…. probably shouldn't've done that.” He breathes.

For a moment, you’re too astonished to say anything, your heart just… plummeting. 

“Sorry?” You query, rolling on your side to look at him, trying to keep the disquiet from your voice. You fail, and he winces.

“no! no, i mean, just… we don’t know how your magic works, right, so maybe adding, uh, other elements into the mix… i mean, we don’t know what i’m doin’ to you...” He attempts, looking more and more unhappy as he sees your face. 

“You regret it.” You say, suddenly feeling cold. “You think that was a mistake, now that you’re done.” Oh, maybe he’s not that different from other guys after all. 

“no! well, uh, maybe-” He begins, and you’re suddenly just done with this, astonished by how much this hurts, how much that ‘maybe’ hurts. “i’m just saying, it’s, uh, it’s not good science-” He stammers, and your eyes narrow, and you sit up abruptly, sore, your head spinning.

“I’m not an experiment, Sans.” You snap, not looking at him. “And if you had some issue with what we’re doing, the time to speak was an hour ago.”

“oh… oh, fuck. no, no, i don’t regret it! but, i don’t know, we don’t know what i’m doing to you, babe!” He sits up, looking awfully upset. 

“Probably would have been a good thing to mention an hour ago.” You repeat icily, standing up and refusing to look at him. “You don’t get to just do that to me, tell me it wasn’t a good thing, now that you’ve got your rocks off.”

“my what - no, look, that’s not what i’m saying, i just, i don’t want you to get hurt with this!” 

“Well, good thing I bought those condoms then, huh? So you could remember this was a concern, you know, an hour ago?” You say, surprised at how angry you feel. You’re just, god, you’re blindsided! You never expected him to be so thoughtless. Clearly, you weren’t on the same page after all, because that had clearly, god, _clearly_ meant a lot more to you than it had to him! “Your magic isn’t hurting me. I don’t know what it’s doing, but it’s not hurting me.” You snap, your back to him, as you look quickly for your clothes. “If anything, it saved my life last night.” You dress with quick, decisive moments, feeling his miserable stare on your back. “I’m not a mistake.” You finally hiss. “I didn’t think you’d ever act like I was a mistake.”

He breathes in sharply. “of course you’re not-”

“Hey!” Undyne’s voice is crisp and loud in the hallway. “Lovenerds! Hate to ruin the party, but Paula’s at the front gate again!”

Oh, of course she is. 

“I’m gonna go deal with this.” You mutter, and step out of your room quickly, stinging and sore and hurt and ready to tear some awful bitch a new one.


	48. In Which It Snows A Little

Undyne’s waiting for you in the hall. She does a double take, seeing the expression on your face. “Woah, buddy. You okay?”

“Not really.” You breathe, pushing your hair out of your eyes. Ugh, you can feel him on you, in you, and you are in just absolutely no mood to deal with that right now. You feel so stupid! He was just like everyone else. Asshole had his fun then said it was wrong. Fucking typical. “C’mon, I gotta deal with this bitch.”

“Woah. Hang on.” Undyne blinks. “You’re not going to wait for Sans?”

“Sans isn’t coming.” You pronounce clearly, knowing he’s probably listening behind the door. “This has nothing to do with him.” Undyne looks at you, alarmed. 

“...Hey, pal, are you-”

“I’m _fine._ ” You insist, through clenched teeth, both hands curling into fists. One of them feels like nails on a chalkboard, and you have to take a second, focus, and project a hand around it pointedly. Goddamn it. It feels stupid and small, but you are just miserable that you have to do that, just now, that so much has changed. For a second, you’re simply, brutally unhappy, and then you think of Paula, creeping around your property, coming here for god knows what reason days before she said she would… the anger flares back up, and you try not to dwell on a sweet, punny, boneheaded skeleton who had said something accidentally cruel, as you stew. 

It’s easier to move, so, on a mission you storm downstairs, Undyne at your shoulder. 

“Hey. Hey, what’s up? This isn’t just about Paula, clearly.” She says, and you feel your body tense further. 

“It’s fine.” 

“Will you stop saying everything’s fine!” She snaps. “I know where your head’s at, right now, I know _nothing’s_ fine! And I saw Sans a few hours ago, he couldn’t handle being an inch away from you, so where is he now?!” You pause at the landing, in the foyer, and glare at her for a long moment, even though you’re not angry with her at all. 

“He fucked me and then he said it was a mistake.” You finally hiss, aware that Frisk is somewhere in the house and unwilling to have your voice carry. “Guess he was so turned on by the fact that I lost _half my goddamn arm_ , he couldn’t decide it was a mistake until he was done.” 

“He said it was a mistake?” Undyne breathes, looking surprised, and for an instant, you feel guilty, since it hadn’t been... exactly like that. You think. It had just felt like it.

It had felt a hell of a lot like it. 

You consider, briefly, that in spite of his astonishing lack of tact, that what he’d said wouldn’t have set you off a few days ago, then scowl again. 

“Want me to beat him up?” Undyne’s muttering, looking protectively at you. “I can probably beat him-”

“No! No.” You take a deep breath. “Leave him alone, Undyne. I’ll deal with this mess later. I want to get this bitch off my front yard and away from Frisk right now.” You mutter, and stride to the front door, feeling prickly all over, yanking it open before Paula has the chance to knock. 

She stands there, in the door frame, looking awfully tired and pathetic, but when she sees you, her eyes go wide. 

“You’re alive.” She says, and flinches as you step forward, then stumbles backward. You snort, slamming the door behind you (unconsciously, right in Undyne’s face.) You’re in a goddamn mood. 

“Disappointed?” You snarl, your eyes narrowing, and she gasps and shakes her head quickly. No. 

“It’s been on the news all morning. That the house got attacked.” She whispers. “They’re not reporting anything about what happened, not if there were any casualties, nothing. I thought-” 

“No such luck.” You spit, practically shaking with barely contained rage. “Whoever you told to kill me was shit at following directions, bitch.” 

She stares at you in utter astonishment, and for a second or two, when you realize her confusion seems awfully genuine, you stare back at her, suddenly feeling equally bewildered. 

“I-I didn’t…” She whispers. “I just came here to see if you were -”

“They were here looking for Frisk!” You snap, regaining your outrage. “You honestly expect me to believe-”

“W-what….” She’s not paying attention. She’s looking down at your side. She’s seen your arm, and she, she clearly doesn’t think that you’re badass, not one bit. “Oh, god, what did they do to you, Tadpole?” She breathes, sounding terribly upset. She looks like she might vomit, looking at you. You haven’t heard that nickname in a long, long time. She doesn’t deserve to be using it. 

Your stomach twists, and for moment, some distant part of your brain opens, spooling through all the things that you could do to her - there’s so many things! There’s so many ways that you could hurt her, but right now, your brain is coming back to bones, over and over again, and you can practically feel one forming in your hand for a second, you can practically feel one shuddering into life, all the easier to throw, or to spear… and then you think of Sans, lying there in your bed saying that you were a mistake, and your fingers slip through it into nothingness, forming a fist once more. “Those monsters-” Paula starts.

“Humans did this to me.” You snarl, and she flinches again. 

“Those were the monsters I was talking about.” She whispers, looking at your arm again. “________, you’ve got to go to the hospital, that’s not-” 

“It’s nothing that can be fixed!” You growl, stepping forward again, your hand twitching. Something’s pooling around it now, and when you spare a glance down, you see that it’s not orange-red flames, or piercing blue flames, but a subdued, somehow menacing purple color that’s covering your hand. Paula sees it, and gasps. 

“________, this isn’t right, you need help, I’ll take you, I’ll get you help.” She whispers, and for a second, you entertain the thought, thinking of a human doctor picking up your arm, trying to do - what? What exactly? 

“You can’t help.” You say softly, and then grimace, the soft sound of footsteps in the snow coming around the corner of the house from the back yard. It was Sans, right, it had to be Sans (he wouldn’t leave you to face her on your own - oh, god, had he left you on your own?). You whirl around, but not before Paula shrieks. Whatever vague sense of sympathy you’d seen in her eyes has disappeared the second she spots her new target. She looks… hungry. Jealous. Greedy. 

“MY BABY!” She wails, and Papyrus and Frisk, who’d clearly been racing each other in some sort of challenge, grind to a halt. Papyrus looks down at Frisk, then up at Paula, something busy in his eyes. Frisk doesn’t notice Papyrus, scrambling forward, a look of disbelief verging on anger (maybe fear?) on their face. “There you are, baby, there you are! Momma’s here! Momma’s gonna take you home, and keep you safe, and you’ll never, ever have to see these awful people, ever-” Paula coos, attempting to shove past you. 

You snap. Something strange and new and... maternal? makes you step, instantly, in between Frisk and Paula, and you understand, suddenly, all those warnings you’d always heard about never getting between a grizzly and her cub, because, hell, this kid might be biologically hers, but Frisk was your responsibility now, suddenly, somehow; you refused to let your cousin get hurt ever again.  
You’d promised. 

You lash out, without even thinking, your bony hand swinging through the air, and it’s like time slows to a crawl. 

Well, no, you reflect, watching the wave of purple magic surge towards Paula, it’s not _like_ time slows to a crawl, that’s exactly it, time just shivers to a halt in the wave of the boiling fury that’s just exploded from you. You know instantly, without thinking, that this isn’t something you’ve stolen from Sans. No, this, right here…

This is yours. 

Frisk grinds to a standstill, their hand pulled back into a tiny fist, fury clear on their face. Papyrus, scrabbling to hold Frisk back, shudders to a stop as well, his eyes wide and worried. Paula freezes too, looking somewhere between thrilled and scared and horrified, and you stand there in the middle of this frozen circle of time, breathing hard. There’s a purple… a something, a dome, and you’re the center of it, and nothing’s moving in the middle, not at all, and you can’t see the sky at all, just this barrier you’ve erected with Paula and Frisk and Papyrus in the center, and… There’s errant snowflakes, suspended in the air in front of you, and they refuse to move, and you’re suddenly so tired again...

 **Oh, my. You’re a fast learner.** That… clicking, that crunching sound from last night splits into your brain, and you jump, eyes wild, trying to find the source. **Don’t bother. I’m not really here. Just… observing.** The voice breathes. **Since I gave you your arm, I was curious what you would decide to do with it.**

You can’t see who’s speaking, can’t see anything odd, but - no, if you reach out with your soul, the way you did to find Sans earlier - can’t think about him - oh, something _almost_ shudders into place, something almost the shape of a man. It immediately disintegrates, and a pleasant, deep male voice chuckles. 

**Goodness, you’re stubborn.** He laughs. **I can see what my son sees in you.** You twitch irritably again, trying not to think about Sans. There’s so much magic bubbling beneath your skin now, and you’re itching to strike out, and you don’t have the faintest idea what you’re-

 **This must be quite hard for you. Monster children learn their magic very young.** The voice - Gaster’s voice - clicks. **You don’t even know what your attack is yet. Though, I must say, this time freeze, it’s very… interesting.** The voice laughs. **You know they can’t see you, from the outside of this bubble, right?** Gaster drawls. **How interesting. I dare say, you might be borrowing some of my magic too.** His voice grows low, and dangerous, and he repeats, **HOW INTERESTING.**

There’s a brief surge of something, for just a second or so, and then the feeling of him fades, and no matter how hard you try, you can’t see the faint flicker of his shape any longer. 

Time crawls by, and noting moves, and you don’t move, and the voice - Gaster’s voice - has vanished. How much time passes, you’re not entirely sure. You know this much, that your heartbeat grows steady, and your breathing grows slow, and the ache disappears entirely from your arm, as the hours (days?) creak by. Time doesn’t seem urgent in here. This doesn’t seem like somewhere you need to leave. You have time, so much time, to collect yourself. 

You don’t move much, you barely expend any energy. The thought occurs to you several times, the image of a fish, trapped beneath a frozen pond, slowing its metabolism and thoughts and actions enough to survive the harshness of the winter. And time still passes, and nothing in this dome changes, and the raw parts of you grow less and less raw, until finally, you look at Paula, really look at her, and see through her for the first time, deep into her soul;

It’s gray, like slush on a city sidewalk. It’s tarnished, filthy, wounded in ways you can’t understand. And there, hidden away in the core of her soul, like a rat in a nest of cotton-candy insulation, is the faint, soft glow of something red, something pure, something like… something like Frisk. You look at it, then you look at Frisk, and your wild fury ebbs, and for the first time in what feels like a long time, you think about the fact that time should really be moving forward again. 

The bubble bursts, and time begins again without your command. Everything happens all at once. Paula staggers backwards, landing ass first into a pile of snow. Frisk screams, a terrible sound in your brain, and pulls back their hand and *slaps* Paula across the face, and then Papyrus leaps forward, scooping up Frisk, as Paula lunges for the child that she’d pretended to care so much about just seconds ago - 

“enough.” Sans is next to you, dressed and wild and furious, before you know what to think. “paps, frisk, inside.” Papyrus gulps guiltily. 

“YES, BROTHER.” He hauls Frisk up onto his shoulders, and Frisk, as wild as a feral animal at the sight of Paula, _spits_ at her as the skeleton hauls them inside. Sans smirks at this for a second, then looks at you, his eyes dark and dangerous. 

“you okay?” He asks you in an aside, and, your voice cracking, you instantly reply, 

“No! I’m not okay!” It feels like an admission of guilt, and Paula, that bitch, she sees how perturbed you are and smiles, she smiles, like a toad that’s spotted a fly, like a cat with a mouse, but she doesn’t know Sans, and she doesn’t know you, because neither of you are anything like prey to this woman. 

“i could send her to the void.” He says, offhandedly. “or, er, you could do the honors.” You think about this. Yes. You could send her to the void, you’re quite aware of this now. It would be so easy, and indeed, behind the curtain separating you from the void, something’s calling to you, eager-

“Hm.” You whisper, and make a small gesture, almost testing… a sliver of sky splits open, and then the urgent force of what’s on the other side pushes, strains at the little hole, then bursts through, a joyous trill sounding in your head. 

You recognize this; too, this creature from the other side, a floating, eager skull that can’t wait to be at your side, reminding you inexorably of Lesser Dog, except for the scale. This skull is much bigger on its own, just a skull, than Lesser Dog is as a complete being, and it is terrifying in its own right. It floats over to you and nudges your skeletal hand with the tip of its snout, looking for a reassuring scratch, and as you do so, running smooth bone along smooth bone, Paula screams again.

“YOU’RE ALL FREAKS! YOU’VE TWISTED MY BABY AND YOU’RE FREAKS!” She yells, utterly beside herself. The … what had Sans said his father had called them, Gaster Blasters? It coos a concerned noise next to you, and you shiver, running your fingers over the bone again. 

“go to your home, paula.” Sans hisses. “you won’t like what happens if you don’t. this isn’t your house. _______ isn’t your niece. frisk isn’t your child. you are _done_ here.”

The being at your side, the one who isn’t your boyfriend, growls softly when Sans has finished speaking, and you can feel more of them now, hanging on the other side of the void, waiting to be told to strike...

Paula gulps, staring at your new friend (your new weapon), and reaches a conclusion. 

“Fine.” She snaps. “Keep the deaf garbage. I’m done with you both.” She backs up, you growl, and she walks very quickly away from you and Sans and the Blaster, her back ramrod straight as she keeps darting looks over her shoulder to make sure you’re not just waiting to attack. 

Sans watches her too, all the way into her car, then down the driveway, then off into the late afternoon. “_______, i’m so sorry.” He breathes, and you inhale, and the Blaster and the hole in space and everything else you’ve created winks out of existence, leaving reality wrinkled for a second, painful to look at, before it smooths out. You look down at him, feeling so old and tired and weak, and you don’t twitch away when his hand finds yours again, phalanges against flesh, as you struggle with the idea that everything’s different, now, and there’s nothing you can do to change that.


	49. In Which Frisk is Great at Naming Stuff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HERE IS A CHAPTER, I'M ALL WORKED UP.

He comes downstairs cautiously, feeling as miserable as he’d ever felt. There’s a dull pounding in his skull, and for the first time in a long, long time, he’s just wishing that a reset would happen, that whoever was pulling the strings would spool time back a few minutes so he wouldn’t say the stupid thing that hadn’t needed saying in the first place. God, he knew you weren’t coping as well as you were acting, he could see that on your face, in her eyes, the moments where you weren’t forcing yourself to act. Even the sex - god, especially the sex! - had been you struggling to come to terms with everything that had happened in the past twenty-four hours, and he’d been…

Well, he’d been a real asshole, for a dude who didn’t have one. 

He hesitates, seeing Undyne inside the foyer, staring through a window. She’s not outside with _______ and Paula, and that makes him anxious. “uh.” He clears his throat, and she whips her head around, scowling when she sees him. 

“Probably not a good idea to go out there, _bud_.” She snaps pointedly, and he groans, running his hand over his skull and feeling so incredibly stupid. Of course you'd told Undyne, you'd been so furious with him…

“scooch.” He demands, wanting her vantage point at the window. She gives him an “are you fucking serious right now” look, and he decides, after a second of her withering regard, not to press the matter. He crosses the foyer and takes up position at the window with a slightly worse vantage point of the scene, and he wonders if you know that he’s there, if he should step outside. After a few seconds, they both wince, as Paula notices her niece’s arm and begins to panic, and _________ looks so… you look angry and pained and desperate. 

“Uh.” Undyne clears her throat, temporarily forgetting that she’s pissed at him. “Do you think we should-”

“nah.” He says quickly, thinking about how well _that_ would go down. Besides, the whole fight, he figured, had happened because he was so busy fretting about your health and feeling uncertain about what was happening to you, and he had been too thick skulled to realize that you were, naturally, just as worried about the same things. He thought about the previous night, how good, how righteous it had felt to just… work out a little bit of his anger on the people trying to hurt his family. He wasn’t selfish enough to deprive you of the same opportunity, right?

Or maybe… heh, hell, maybe he just really wanted to see Paula get dunked on. 

Who could blame him?

“Woah. That’s new.” Undyne mutters, seeing the purple light creep over your arm. He blinks, then stares closely. That _is_ new. His first instinct is to panic, but he’s very, very good at hiding that panic. He’s had an eternity to get good at hiding that panic. 

“not looking good for paula, is it.” He drawls, raising an eyebrow ridge. Undyne snorts, glancing over at him with a bloodthirsty smile, before she remembers she’s not on his team and scowls again, looking away. It takes her another few seconds to speak. 

“We should probably step in if things go south.” She points out, and he nods unwillingly.

“give her some time.” He whispers, thinking about his own father for a second, how much he wished that he had the opportunity just one more time to tear into him, to tear him to pieces for what he had done to Papyrus - who didn’t seem to be exactly right after that fight, god, there was another thing he needed to handle soon - and… and what Gaster had done to him, too. You look miserable, sure, but also somehow happy, victorious even, and Sans knows, god, he knows that this has been such a long time coming, and that you need this. “we don’t step in unless something goes-”

“Uh oh.” Undyne catches the flash of movement first.

“what?!”

“Something went.” She says, nodding, and Sans sees them too, Papyrus and Frisk happily sailing towards you and Paula, and for a second, he’s frozen, just frozen, seeing the look on Frisk’s face twist from bliss to hate _-he’s seen that face before, oh god, it’s happening again it’s happening again-_ and he’s only just gained his composure enough to make a doorway to get in between Paula and Frisk when something snaps. For a millisecond, he swears he sees something rise from you, blast from your body like a mushroom cloud, the inside a vibrant purple, the outside that sickly, impenetrable black that he’d been seeing all too often these past few days. It slides down around them like a dome, a… barrier, god, a **barrier** with Paula and Frisk and Papyrus and you in the middle, all the people he loved in the middle (well, barring Paula, he was not a fan of Paula), and he’s about to scream when, just like that, it’s gone.

You stand just where you had been, looking… calm, as everyone else staggers and Frisk screams wordlessly, scrambling to try to strike at Paula, and Sans is inclined to allow this too, but Papyrus, kind, loyal Papyrus, is not. He dances from foot to foot anxiously, trying to figure out how to stop this.

“Uh, did you just see something… weird?” Undyne’s squinting dubiously, clearly uncertain that anything’s happened at all. Sans hesitates. 

“dunno. get my bro and the kiddo in?” He says, and steps through the doorway he’s created, feeling angry enough to send Paula on a trip that she’ll never come back from, as she lunges at Frisk, feeling furious enough to rain down hell, but then he meets your eyes, just for a second, and he remembers his place. You can handle this. You don’t need saving.

The blaster that you call from the void, oh, it loves you so much that he nearly smiles, a genuine, besotted smile and you don't even blink, you just reach out and scratch it like it's a puppy and he knows then, he knows that you'll be fine, you're not fine but you will be, even with all the changes, all the magic, even with everything being new, and when he reaches out to take your hand and you let him, the acidic panic in his chest fades to a dull thrum. 

You’ll be okay. You’ll be okay on her own. He needs to stop hovering, stop replaying every single decision he makes in his head to try and find the way that he’s hurting her, because there’s no more resets up here, there’s no spooling back, no changing time, and if he loses you, he’ll lose you for good. 

**********************

You stand there, holding his hand for a long time. Finally, he speaks. 

“hey, uh, look, i said something really stupid back there. but you’re not a mistake. never. what i- what we did wasn’t wrong.” His thumb moves over the soft skin of your left hand cautiously, and finally, you nod. 

“It wasn’t cool, bonehead.” You whisper.

“i know.”

“You really hurt my feelings.”

“i know. i’m sorry.” 

“I was so angry, I almost killed Paula, I think.” You mutter, and he snorts out a laugh, and you do too, and you let go of his hand. “I’m gonna go for a walk.” You decide. 

“want company?” He asks cautiously, and you hesitate, thinking. It would be nice to have someone with you to rub your back and tell you that you’re okay, but you’re just… a mess of emotions right now. You need time to think. Time without him. 

“I need some time.” You confess. “Time on my own to think this all through.” It’s funny, now that you’ve calmed down some, you don’t have the faintest idea how you’d done any of the things you’d just done, how you’d frozen time in a bubble like a snowglobe, how you’d sliced that little hole that the skull had come bouncing through, full of love for you. “Go on. Go in, find Paps and Frisk, talk to them, okay? I’m gonna go down to the beach.” You say, and brace yourself for the argument - how dare you go down to the scene of the battle alone - but it doesn’t come.

“k. here.” He shrugs off his coat without questioning you for a second, and passes it over. For a second, you’re worried - it’s not like him to be so okay with this, is he done with you, is he just pretending - and then he pauses when you slip it on, stares at you, then hugs you hard. “see you when you’re ready.” He murmurs, releases you, and trudges back inside the house. You take a moment, inhaling the scent of the coat - it smells like him, and you’re not emotional enough or irritated enough with him not to love that. 

The backyard is no longer a pristine, snowy scene. There’s too many footprints in the snow, too many smears of red, or, eugh, brown … gross, gross, you try not to think about that. You just charge right through all the mess, down onto the beach, and are relieved when your favorite spot is still undisturbed. It’s sunny, and oddly warm again for the day after Christmas, and you feel comfortable plopping your butt down on the dune, over the sea grass and snow, and leaning back. 

What had just happened?

You felt better, you had to admit, you felt so much better after that endless pause in the bubble. Better enough to let him hug you, to consider that you might owe him an apology for overreacting too. But now that your head wasn’t filled with Sans, you had to think about all the questions that hadn’t been answered, not at all. 

Paula had seemed legitimately upset, to see you hurt. Well… you flex your hand experimentally, dragging your bones through the snow and sand, and shiver. It wasn’t really a hurt, anymore, was it? It was just… new.

“I have a skeleton arm.” You try out, speaking quietly to yourself. “I am a human being with a skeleton arm.” Oh, no, suddenly you’re on the verge of hysterical laughter, and there’s that - that keening, that joyful eagerness in your mind again from somewhere very far away. Huh. 

Very tentatively, you raise your arm, and close your eyes, and push, trying to find the source of that spike of joy. It’s everywhere and nowhere, it’s in the space between molecules, it’s in a place that hurts and feels like home all at the same time, and you _push_ -

Elegantly, a door slides open again, just the right size this time, and the skull - your friend - glides through, an excited rainbow of sounds chirping in your head. You know without thinking that it’s the same one from before, and you’re not at all surprised when it flops to the ground next to you and snuggles right up by your side, keening joyfully. You look at it for a second, then reach out slowly and resume scratching it’s - her? Her. Her head. 

“I’m gonna need a name for you, buddy.” You whisper to yourself, looking at the open door to the void. The enormous skull chirps contentedly, and you scratch it again, leaning carefully against it. 

There’s the soft sound of footsteps behind you, and you nearly snap your neck, looking for the source, and your friend growls irritably. You relax, seeing the source of the footsteps a second later. 

“Hey Frisk.” You murmur. Frisk looks teary and miserable, but is bundled up tightly, and takes no time at all to scramble up the small dune and tuck themselves in on your left side. The skull makes a soft “?” in your brain, and you very reasonably explain, “It’s my cousin,” before realizing how absolutely insane this whole situation is. Frisk has noticed the doorway to the void and is tugging your sleeve, looking horrified, gazing into it. You wince, think hard about how to do this, then begin to close the doorway. Your friend on the other side whimpers, and you hesitate, and then very cautiously, like zippering up a tent door, you leave it _almost_ all the way shut. Your friend grumbles, satisfied. Frisk takes a deep breath, then looks at you, then the skull, then clambers into your lap, looking too exhausted for even non-verbal communication. 

You wrap your arm tightly around them, kissing the back of their head without thought. “She’s a liar, Frisk.” You whisper. “She’s - “

“ **I know. I know.** ” Frisk says quietly. “ **I didn’t think I’d ever see her again. She asked me to come home. She didn’t even care that I left.** ” They shudder, and the skull by your side lets out a soft, almost apologetic groan. “ **______, what is that thing?** ” They add softly. “ **It looks like… like things I saw in the underground** ”

“I don’t really know.” You mutter. “I guess it’s kind of a stray. Well, she. I think it’s a she.” You hug Frisk a little closer, and wait for their breathing to slow, their trembling inhalations to come easier. 

“ **Can I name it?** ” Frisk finally asks. 

“Sure, sweetie. I don’t think it’ll mind.” You murmur. Frisk scrunches up their face to think about this for a while. 

“ **Spot.** ” They finally decide, and you blink, then burst out laughing. “ **What?** ” Frisk sounds a little insulted. 

“It - she’s a skull! She doesn’t have any…” Frisk scrunches up their face at you and you remember, suddenly, how young they are. “Fine. Spot.” You glance over at the grizzly sized skull that’s snuggled up to your right. “That okay with you?”

It chirrups happily.

You sit there for a while, the three of you.

“ **I’m not garbage.** ” Frisk finally whispers.

“Of course not.” You reassure them, smoothing their hair slowly. “She’s… she’s hurt in her head, sweetie. She doesn’t know what she’s saying.” 

“ **You won’t let her take me back, right?** ” Frisk finally asks. “ **You’ll keep me safe, and I’ll keep you safe, deal?** ” You pause, then nod firmly. 

“Deal.” You promise.

The three of you sit there, more or less in silence, until the sun slips under the horizon.


	50. In Which Everything Goes Right To Shit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FIFTY CHAPTERS.  
> FIFTY FREAKING CHAPTERS.
> 
> Guys, let me just extend again, my immense gratitude and thankfulness that you guys all decided to come on this ride with me. This has just been such a blast, and I can't believe... basically, any of this. I can't believe how many wonderful friends I've made, or how willing everyone's been to embrace me, even at my most ridiculous. I'm so excited for the rest of this fic, and I can't wait to take you along the rest of the path with me. 
> 
> ...  
> I MEAN, UH, WHATEVER NO BIG. *tries desparately to seem cool*

Finally, you nudge Frisk, who’s stopped trembling, and looks like they’re well on their way to a peaceful slumber. You probably should be freezing, but the skull - Spot, you correct yourself quickly - is so warm that you actually feel very comfortable. Still;

“We’d better head in, Frisk. I’m sure your mom’s worried about you.” You murmur. Frisk sighs sleepily, stretches their arms, and climbs off your lap, standing up slowly. You glance at the - Spot, you glance at Spot, and carefully ease your body weight off the huge skull. Spot groans unhappily, and rises off the ground when you stand up, hovering by your side. “Sorry, Spot.” You murmur. “You’d better go home now, okay?” You scratch it one last time, and it looks almost reluctantly at you, then at the tiny sliver of void that you’ve left open. “I promise, we’ll play again.” You tell the massive beast, feeling a little silly and feeling entirely unsure if she could even understand what you were saying. It huffs quietly, and butts against you carefully, then drags itself (somehow dramatically) back over to the tiny hole in the universe you’ve left open. 

“ **Where’s she going?** ” Frisk asks, their brow furrowed. You smile a little. 

“Back home, kiddo.”

“ **Can’t she stay?** ” Frisk protests, and you think about this. 

“I don’t think so.” You murmur. “This isn’t her world. If I closed the door back to her home, I think she wouldn’t be able to stay, and I don’t want to see if it would hurt her.” Frisk nods solemnly at that. “Okay, bud, look away.” You caution, and concentrate, carefully peeling that hole in reality open again. It’s… tiring. Opening up a door to somewhere else was one thing; you had to be able to think clearly about two distinct locations, and then yank them together and push at the same time. You understand a little better where you’d messed up the other night; you’d had lots of time to think about this in the bubble where time refused to flow. The other night, you’d pushed through that fabric at an angle, you’d made the hole much, much too high…

It was different than accessing the void, though. The void was tough. It was like taking a razor blade to a piece of cloth and trying to split the fabric in half, not length or widthwise, but in thickness, in that third dimension you rarely think of flat things existing in. It was painstaking, mentally.

The door slides open once more, and Spot huffs out a sigh, gives you one last loving chirp, and glides back through. Breathing hard, you seal the door tightly behind her. “Kay, Frisk. You’re good.” You say, seeing that Frisk has their hand clapped tightly over their eyes. They remove it cautiously. 

“ **Hey, ________?** ” They ask, tentatively. “ **How are you doing this stuff? I thought we couldn’t use magic… I mean, except, the soul stuff?** ” You look down at them and shrug.

“I don’t think most humans can do the soul stuff either.” You mutter. “I think maybe we’re a little different. I don’t know.” Frisk frowns, and you give them a quick smile. “It’s not a bad thing, being different, Frisk.” You tell them quietly. “You know that, right?” They look dubiously at you, and you think once again, how horrible it must have been to have Paula as the main influence for the first seven years of Frisk’s life. “It’s okay to be different.” You say firmly. “There’s no such thing as a normal person, kiddo. We’re all weirdos, deep down. Anyone who says that they’re normal just isn’t comfortable with whatever kind of weird they are, I think.” You ruffle their hair, unable to help yourself. 

“ **Mo- Paula said that I was… I don’t know the word. Looks like ‘detective’ when she speaks. Means I’m broken.** ” Frisk mutters, and you grit your teeth. 

“I don’t think you’re broken.” You assure them. “I think you’re just different in a way that a lot of people don’t understand. A lot of people are weird on the inside, so it’s not so easy to see. You… and me,” You glance down at your arm, your hand sticking out of Sans’ borrowed sleeve, “we’re weird on the outside. People are gonna notice us no matter what, I think.” You say, then shake your head. “But you know what? Anyone who thinks that there’s something wrong with us, just because we’re different, they’re not worth our time. We’re awesome. We can do lots of things that ‘normal’ people can’t do.” You remind them, and Frisk giggles. “Right?” You encourage. “You and me, we’re the real deal, bud. We’re not just a deaf kid and a freak, right? We can use sign language, and uh, reach in narrow places I guess? We can see souls, and we can make friends with any monster, no matter how scary they look. We’re total badasses! Oof… uh, don’t tell Toriel I just swore.” You catch yourself, but Frisk is now laughing hard. “But you get it, right? We’re humans who use magic, like from all the old stories. We’re pretty dang cool! We’re like Harry Potter!” You rationalize. 

“ **Who’s that?** ” Frisk says, tilting their head. You stare at them for a long time. 

“Oh my god. Okay. We’re fixing this.” You finally say, and grin, the smile finally, truly feeling natural on your face again. “Race you back?” Frisk lets out a quick laugh, their eyes bright, then tears off. 

“Cheater!” You call, sprinting off after them with a huge smile on your face, and at last the ache and trauma from the past month no longer seems so insurmountable anymore.

\--------------------------------

Frisk beats you - barely - to the back door, and the both of you clatter inside, laughing and stomping snow off your boots. “Oh man, it’s a million degrees in here!” You exclaim, grinning at Frisk. “Guess we got used to the snow, bud.” 

“heh. i’ll take my jacket back if you want.” You jump at the noise, and see Sans sidling around the corner into the kitchen. 

“Oh! Jeez, you scared me.” You say, suddenly feeling a little awkward.

“heh, uh, sorry babe, didn’t mean to startle.” He looks pretty nervous, like he’s worried you’ll start snapping at him again, so you take a deep breath, sliding out of his jacket, then hand it back to him with a raised eyebrow. 

“It’s cool. I was just a little al _arm_ ed.” You drawl. He pauses in his motion to reach for the coat. 

“...did you really just-”

“Almost jumped out of my _skin_.” You say innocently, batting your eyelashes. 

“oh my god.” Sans says, with flat affect. Frisk snickers next to you, and you lean in, and murmur, 

“I didn’t realize there was anyone in the _radius._ ” 

He can’t take it. He groans then bursts out laughing, just a little harder than you think he normally would have just for a few bad skeleton arm puns. He seems profoundly relieved, and you realize just how worried he must have been, earlier, that you might still be furious with him, or worse, done with him entirely. Frisk rolls their eyes at Sans - it definitely wasn’t that funny - then tugs your hand. Oh, yeah. 

“Hey, bonehead, we’re gonna marathon Harry Potters and eat leftovers until Toriel says it’s bedtime, you want to join?” You offer, an olive branch. 

“yep.” He says, almost instantly. “but, uh, i still don’t know what that is.”

“Jeez, were you guys under a rock or… oh, god, that was tactless.” You mutter, when Frisk bursts out laughing again and Sans grudgingly follows suit. “Oh, jeez.” 

“there were probably a few _barriers_ between us finding out about it, babe.” Sans drawls, grinning, and ambles behind you and Frisk, hovering slightly while you dig out the DVDs. Once you get the first one going, you plop down on the big sofa next to Frisk. He hesitates, and you have to pat the space next to you pointedly before he sits down, again, looking rather relieved.

“ **Hey, everyone! Come here, we’re going to watch an important human movie!** ” Frisk bellows officiously, making the inside of your head ring for a second. You narrow your eyes at them, and grin back at you, though they snuggle a little closer, looking much less mischievous, when they see that you’re setting up the captions for the movie without needing to be asked. 

Papyrus arrives first, and promptly squeezes into the tiny amount of space on the other side of Frisk, making you all shift until you’re practically in Sans’ lap (he doesn’t seem to mind this at all). “OH! A HARRY POTTER!” He exclaims. “WE USED TO BUY MACARONI AND CHEEZ SHAPED LIKE A HARRY POTTER, BROTHER! I HOPE THIS IS AS GOOD AS MACARONI!”

Undyne and Alphys show up next, looking like maybe they’d been awoken from a nap, with Lesser Dog at their heels. “What’s the big deal, squirt?” Undyne asks, yawning, then notices you sitting next to Sans and arches an eyebrow minutely. You shrug, equally minutely. You’re not mad anymore. She rolls her eye and gives you an affectionate grin as Frisk tries to explain what’s going on - they recognize the logo, now, but they don’t know anything about the story. Alphys does, of course. 

“I-I-If any of the f-fanfiction I’ve seen is right, it’s about a b-blonde guy who wants to smooch a g-guy with glasses!” She says knowledgeably, plopping down next to Undyne in the loveseat. 

“What’s all this talk about smooching!” Toriel walks in, her brow furrowed. “Frisk, I am not sure you’re old enough to watch this film, child.” As you reassure her that, no, Frisk will be fine, Asgore and Mettaton arrive, coming up from the cellar. 

“Well, we made Alphys’ generator permanent.” Mettaton’s saying, brushing his hands together. “Nobody will be able to cut the power here any longer, so - oh!” His eyes dart to your arm (right, half these people hadn’t even seen it yet) and you raise it slowly, giving him a sheepish wave. 

“SHH! THE MOVIE IS STARTING! I LOVE TRAGIC ROMANCES BETWEEN PEOPLE WITH YELLOW HAIR AND PEOPLE WITH GLASSES. THEY NEVER GET OLD!” Papyrus insists, and Asgore chuckles.

“Well… I’ve actually seen this movie already, so, I’ll see about getting some dinner going.” He says wryly in his deep bass, dimming the lights. “Enjoy, everyone.” He winks at Toriel, who blushes prettily, then walks into the kitchen. 

Everyone does, immensely. Ghost trots out to hop up on Papyrus’ lap about fifteen minutes later, and you watch all of Sorcerer’s Stone, break quickly for a dinner that manages to deplete the rest of the leftovers, and then resume your positions immediately. About halfway through Prisoner of Azkaban, Sans very tentatively shifts, easing his arm behind you, and you wonder how long he’d been thinking about doing that. 

******************************

He’d been thinking about doing that, he thinks anxiously, since the second you sat down next to him. He braces for the backlash, but you simply hold still for a second, and then, equally tentatively, rest your head on his shoulder, cuddling deliberately against him.

He hoped you weren’t looking at his soul at that moment, because it felt like it was shining so brightly in sheer, giddy relief and joy, well, it might have hurt your eyes.


	51. In Which Sans Gets Unbearably Jealous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I was a little more on time with this chapter, I wouldn't be able to share this with you:
> 
> [SUM GOOD SKART, BABY](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138595632061/submitted-by-undertalez4me-im-sorry-oh)
> 
> I love you all, never change.

The rest of the night passes peacefully enough. You’d been nervous, a little, leaning against Sans. It was funny… you’d fought that morning, but it already felt like ages. Well… for you, it had been ages. Maybe not ages, but, god, how long had you spent in that bubble? What even was that bubble? When Hermione pulls out her time turner, you wince, then glance at Sans. For the first time all night, he’s definitely paying attention to the movie, the pinpoints of light fixed on the screen. 

Well, yeah, he’s not going to like this one bit. 

“Hey,” You murmur, nudging him gently. “You okay?” He gives you something that’s almost a smile and nods, then, tentatively, very slowly, reaches out to slide his fingers through your hair, looking half convinced that you’re going to yell at him. You want to show him that it’s okay, because you suspect that he’s looking for something to make him feel grounded, certain that time isn’t going to start skipping again. It’s clearly got him on edge, the cavalier way that these humans are manipulating time, and you just don’t want him any more upset, now that your irritation with him has dissipated entirely. 

...Hm. Maybe you should put off mentioning that whole timestop thing you’d pulled off this afternoon, then, huh? He seems pretty worried about losing you as it is, you don’t want to know what would happen if you mentioned that you seemed to have some degree of control over time, just now. Even if it wasn’t a reset, even if it was just, like… 

You eye your old N64, gathering dust in the entertainment center, and remember how you and your dad used to spend evenings duking it out over Super Smash Brothers, bickering about who was better, Pikachu or Ness, how you’d used to drive him nuts by pressing “start” and freezing the game, rotating the camera and laughing at how hilariously the characters were posed.

Pause, you thought, feeling his bones trace against your scalp. It was a pause, what you’d done. 

He’s still looking at you nervously, and you realize you’ve been lost in thought, not really reacting, so you give him a small smile and lean your head back onto his shoulder, feeling a little anxious yourself, that you’ll say the wrong thing and hurt him, or that… 

God, the world had just gotten so much bigger, these last few days. You’d gotten bigger (not physically, of course, if you wanted to be technical you’d actually gotten smaller, all... arms considered and all). Inside of you, though, there were all these new parts of you waking up. Your mind - and your soul? - had been racing, sprinting, trying to keep up with everything. Now that you had a second to breathe, you felt like you hardly knew who you were. You hadn’t changed, of course, but… you had?

Plenty of time to figure that out, with a few days left of vacation and presumably fewer attacks on the house, you decide, snuggling closer to Sans without really thinking about it. Even with Papyrus shrieking about how pretty the dementors are, you’re flagging again, and his playing with your hair never seems to help with that. You could curl up and go to sleep right now, but, well, you’re enjoying this so much, the calm happiness in the room. 

When the movie ends, Toriel stands up. “Frisk, Papyrus, bedtime.” She tells them. The other two occupants of your sofa grumble and stand up. Asgore chuckles and stands up too. 

“I’d best be heading home, myself.” He says quietly. “Kings don’t get much time off, after all.”

“Oh!” You blink. You’d forgotten, somehow, that everyone wouldn’t be staying here forever, than in spite of all the insanity of the past week, eventually, it was just going to be you, Sans, Papyrus and L.D. here. Everyone else had homes, other things, and here you were, being selfish… “Well, Asgore, thank you so much for… everything.” You say, getting quickly to your feet and walking over to the massive king. “I really… I mean…”

“Hush.” He claps a heavy hand on your shoulder, giving you a sorrowful look. “You paid a dear price for your refusal to turn on your friends. I regret so much that I …” He trails off, looking at your arm, and sighs. “I do not believe I am very suited for war.” He mutters, and then squeezes your shoulder and releases you. “You’re welcome in the palace any time, dear. And I’m only a phone call away.” He promises, and then begins to extend his goodbyes to everyone else. 

“Uh, about that.” Undyne sidles over to you, once she’s done hugging the king. “I was wondering… I mean, me and Alphys were talking… look. We’re, uh, we’re worried about you.”

“Undyne-”

“It’s just a really big place for so few people to be around.” She says quietly. “And it seems like…” She grimaces, not liking this serious discussion. “It would be good for you to have people who love you nearby.” She finally pronounces. You glance back at Sans - he’s standing now, hanging back a little behind the king - and she adds, “Lots of people. For, uh, your protection.”   
She shifts slightly from foot to foot, and says, “So I was wondering if it would be cool if we extended our stay here for a little longer, me and Alph? At least until we get the place a little safer?” She says, looking down at the floor. You can’t help but grin. 

“You’re such a goof.” You laugh. “Jeez, honestly, like I’d say no. You guys are welcome, for as long as you need, you know that. Everyone who wants to stay here has a place. For as long as they want to be here.” You say, a little louder, just to make sure that’s clear to all parties, and flush slightly when Sans locks eyes from you across the room, looking at you like… you’re not sure you’re a good enough person to deserve a look from him like that. 

“Y-you’re sure?” Alphys has snuck up behind Undyne. “I-I mean, w-we just want to help-”

“Yeah, guys, I’m sure. As long as you want.” You repeat. Undyne grins, and Alphys gives you a wide, shy smile. 

“this mean i gotta share my lab?” Sans drawls, ambling over. Alphys ducks her head, and Sans gives her a wink. “hey, could always use the company.” He offers. “‘sides, sometimes it’s good to have someone else around, make sure that our experiments don’t get too… ya know?” He offers. Alphys clears her throat. 

“Yeah.” She whispers, and something passes between their eyes that you don’t understand. After that, Sans looks, if anything, relieved. Honestly, Undyne does too, enough that the scrunched up glare she’s been giving Sans all night - she’s more willing to hold a grudge on your behalf than you are! - fades away. 

“Suppose moving my piano here would be kinda silly, huh? I mean, we will be going back home, right babe?” She sounds like she’s trying to convince herself. “At some point?” Alphys chuckles, and you blink, surprised. 

“Undyne, you know we’ve got a piano, right?” 

“WHAT!” She bounces totally upright, looking delighted. 

“Jeez, yeah, I had no idea you played, it’s in the lounge in the other wing of the house!” You laugh. She takes a deep breath, then, trying to sound very calm, says, 

“You mind if I, um, check it out?” You grin. 

“Sure, jeez. I wanna hear you play!” 

“ME TOO!” Papyrus has made his way over.

“ **Mom, please?** ” Frisk begs, and Toriel smiles softly down at her child. 

“One song. Then bed.” She says sweetly. 

“I KNOW WHERE IT IS, I’VE SEEN EVERY ROOM, LET ME SHOW YOU!” Papyrus grabs Undyne’s hand and tugs her away quickly, and you smile, getting ready to follow as the group begins to migrate. Sans catches your hand, squeezing it quickly, and murmurs, 

“i’m gonna take the king home. see you in a few. gotta make the door outside.” He says, and you nod, thinking about how tricky it would be to make a doorway the king would comfortably fit through in here. 

As a result, you end up next to Mettaton in the lounge, as Undyne begins prowling around the piano, her eye wide. Mettaton smiles at you. 

“Hello, darling.” There’s something soft and sad in his voice, and you struggle to recognize it. “May I see your arm, beauty?” He whispers, as everyone else is occupied, and it clicks. 

“It’s okay, Mettaton, really. It’s not like I lost anything, really. It still works.” You say, holding it up for him to look at. He lets out a melodic sigh, and runs a sleek, metallic finger across your palm. You jump slightly, then laugh. 

“Still pretty ticklish. At least it doesn’t hurt anymore.” 

“That seems… fast.” He says, arching a perfect eyebrow. You grimace and shrug, remembering that you’re not going to blab about the pause just yet. He looks back down at your arm, and turns your hand over in his, investigating the back now. “So delicate.” He whispers. “You know, darling, I changed forms, once upon a time. Well… twice, actually.” He says quietly, and glances up at Frisk. Oh, right, you remember this now, how they’d all laughed around the dinner table (except Mettaton) about Frisk’s fight, and the old boxy body that Mettaton had once called his own. You hadn’t thought about that, before, about how that change hadn’t been exactly voluntary. “I remember it being terribly… draining.” He says, looking distant. “I think, maybe, if I’d done it on my own terms… well, it doesn’t matter. It turned out to be for the best. This is the body I was meant to be in, after all.” He looks closer at your hand, then up into your eyes. “I hope you find peace too, ________.” He whispers, and lifts the back of your hand to his lips, kissing it softly, before releasing you to wander over to the side of the piano, that sad look still in his eyes as Undyne sits on the bench and begins to stretch her hands, sounding the keys experimentally. 

“you okay?” You jump slightly, then relax, realizing it’s just Sans before you even turn. Then, of course, you think with trepidation about what he’d just witnessed, surely, Mettaton kissing your hand - oh, god, would he yell at you? You meet eyes with him cautiously, expecting the worst sort of jealousy in his eyes, but he simply looks concerned. “you look sad.” He says quietly, moving a little closer to you as Undyne spots what’s missing - a bottle of ancient scotch tucked away in a cabinet that she helps herself to, in a rocks glass that has to be a little dusty. You smile at her, then down at Sans.

“Yeah. Mettaton was just telling me about the day he fought Frisk.” You murmur, and he glances across the room at Mettaton, then at your arm, then nods to himself. 

“i kinda forgot about that.” He admits. “you should talk to him, i think, when… after some more people have gotten to see your arm. him and undyne. they’ll probably be more help than i could be. i mean,” He pulls a face, “i’ve always been this hot.” He says, holding up his own arm. You groan, nudging him with your hip, then gasp, in spite of yourself, when Undyne starts playing.

It’s not just in your ears. Undyne is focused, totally captivated by the piano, and the notes that she’s playing, they’re in… they’re in your head, too!

Frisk’s eyes are closed, a delighted smile stretching their face, holding onto Toriel’s hand fiercely and breathing hard, and you realize, feeling foolish, that… oh, god, Frisk had spent their first seven years without music, and now…

“great, isn’t it?” Sans whispers, smiling at Frisk from across the room. “you should see ‘em listen to blook’s stuff, they have some on their phone, they’ll listen for hours. toriel doesn’t have the heart to make ‘em stop, even when they’re supposed to be doing homework.” He says fondly, and you grin at your cousin, slipping your arm around Sans’ waist and enjoying the moment. 

Undyne can play! She takes long breaks between each song to sip at the (doubtless expensive) scotch and receive her due adulation, and Toriel permits “one more song” to turn into four or five before she drags Frisk and Papyrus off to bed - Papyrus argues that he’s allowed to stay up later, and Toriel says that if Papyrus wants a bedtime story, he’s coming now. He can’t argue with that logic, so he leaves willingly enough. 

“I should go to bed too. I’m still beat.” You tell the room apologetically. “I don’t want to, though, you’re so good, Undyne!” 

“Aw, shucks, punk!” Undyne laughs, giving you a broad, pointy smile. You wonder for a second what’s got her smiling like _that_ , then realize that Sans, who’s barely stopped looking awkward, now looks absolutely frozen, like he has no idea what he should be doing. You take a breath, wondering if you really want to ask him to join you, and you can practically feel the tension in his bones. 

“Come on up whenever you’re sleepy.” You finally murmur, where his ear should be, and feel him sag, his relief palpable. Well, right, he didn’t like going all night without seeing you, you knew that, but still-

“literally always sleepy.” He says, giving you what he clearly thinks is a casual shrug, and you can’t help but grin again. “night everyone.” 

During the chorus of “night!”s, Undyne gives you a look. She clearly thinks you’re going too easy on him, but, well, she would. You try your best “hey, I’m not going to fool around with him or anything tonight, I feel like I have a while before I’m okay with that and besides, I’m really sleepy” look on her. Her brow furrows, and she mouths,

“Whaaaaaaaat.” Well, alright, maybe that was a lot of information to try to communicate in a glance. At least Sans is on the same page as you. When you get back up to your bedroom (Sans tolerating your chatter the whole way about how good Undyne is at piano), he almost immediately says, 

“gotta brush my teeth, two minutes.” 

You don’t know if he does have to brush his teeth - you’re not entirely sure that’s a thing he does - but you know that he’s giving you space to get changed right now without him watching you, and you take it, then squeeze past him to wash your face and brush your own teeth. When you’re back out, you see he’s changed the sheets on the bed, and is scooting Ghost down to the foot of the bed so you can climb in.

“Thanks.” You say, climbing in and feeling a little awkward again. God, when does this feeling end?! You switch off the bedside lamp quickly, taking refuge in the darkness, and feel his side of the bed sag a moment later. He doesn’t move to hold you, though, and for a while the two of you are there, frozen and clearly still awake, uncertain. Finally, you roll on your side to face him, and ball up your courage into one act, leaning over to kiss him. Again, his relief is palpable, and he moves his arms tightly around you, holding you even when you pull away. “I’m sorry too.” You finally murmur. “I yelled at you, but I wasn’t just mad at you. I was taking it out on you, I know that’s not fair.”

“shh. s’okay.” He assures you quickly. 

“I still love you.” You do your best to show him the sincerity of that statement. “I want to be okay again, us. I know I freaked you out-”

“look.” He cuts you off.

“Hm?”

“ _look._ ” He releases you and sits up, tapping his chest. 

“Oh.” You gather your flagging energy, and _look_. 

He is a kaleidoscope of blues, so vivid it almost hurts, flaring, surging, joyful patterns;

You reach out without thinking about it, and now that you know souls better, you know how to pull, that gesture with your brain that brings that cartoon heart shape up and out of his body, through his stupid novelty tuxedo shirt he’s decided to wear to bed (that you’re more than a little jealous of), hovering and casting light that’s there and isn’t there all at once. Your hand hovers over it, and then you catch yourself, remembering what Undyne had told you, that this was serious, not something monsters did lightly.

“ _please_ ” He whispers hoarsely, after you’ve stayed frozen for a few seconds, and you swallow, and very carefully reach a finger out, tracing it down the side of that ridiculous, beautiful soul. 

Oh.

He is so, so hurt. No. He _has been_ so, so, hurt. He’s healed like a bone that’s been broken too many times - even once would be too many - and it’s left lines, cracks you couldn’t see before... but now it’s so clear, the enormity of the things that he’s witnessed, the frequency of that hurt.

But he loves. In spite of that hurt - maybe because of that hurt - he loves like you could never have imagined. He loves so fiercely, so overwhelmingly. He loves his brother so much, god, he loves Papyrus just as much as Papyrus deserves (and you can tell, now, the towering esteem he holds Papyrus in, the pride, the affection that has always had to slide somewhere between brotherly and paternal). But that’s not all. He’s in love with every single day that starts up new, every single sunrise and sunset, every star, every blade of grass, every gust of wind. He loves life so, so much, even the bad parts, even the parts that hurt. 

And he loves you. He loves parts of you you’ve never noticed, never cared to think about. He loves the face you make after you’ve laughed too hard, the look in your eyes when you’ve just thought of something that you think is particularly clever and can’t wait to share it. He loves the way you look at Frisk, and at Undyne, and at Papyrus, hell, even Mettaton, like you can’t believe people this wonderful could be in your life. 

He loves it so much when you look at him like that. When you look at him like that, the hurt is almost entirely gone, almost an afterthought. 

He is blisteringly smart. He is curious. He is brave. He is wildly mischievous, and he is so, so funny, all the way down to the center of his soul. He is not really lazy, but he likes people to think that he is. He is simply astonishing. You didn’t imagine that anyone could have so much packed inside them, and this is one touch, this is one graze of your finger, and he is -

He is crying.

You pull your hand away carefully, knowing what he’s feeling, and let him gather his soul back up before wordlessly wrapping your arms tight around him, settling your head on his chest and letting him gather himself. 

“i don’t deserve-”

“You are perfect. You deserve everything.” You whisper, kissing his sternum through his shirt. “I understand now.”

“huh?”

“I _know you._ ” You breathe. “How could I ever not be in love with you?”

The awkwardness and fear is long forgotten. You fall asleep like that eventually, holding each other tightly, each convinced that you got the better deal out of the bargain.


	52. In Which The Term "Skarm" Tooooootallly Becomes Canon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We've reached next level.  
> [This](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138656649681/submitted-by-fakeivy1412-i-spent-way-longer-on) is fanart of [this tumblr post](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138440239886/this-is-just-a-random-thought-but-i-can) and all of you are ridiculous trash children and I love you so so so much.

As the next few days pass, you begin to adjust to what has rapidly become the new normal.

Mettaton leaves the next morning, with kisses for everyone, even Sans. Sans tolerates this with the patience of a saint, his eyes barely leaving you for the moment that it takes to pay attention to the melodramatic antics of the robot, the aftereffect of the previous night. Okay, fine, you’d both woken up a little … obnoxiously in love, which everyone else seemed to be doing their best to tolerate. Mettaton hugs you three times, perhaps feeling that he doesn’t have your full attention for the first two, and makes sure that you know that he’s only a phone call away, whenever, but he does need to get some filming done in L.A., dearest. 

The house feels a little less lively in his absence. 

Alphys and Undyne move in that same day, the twenty-seventh. They first act tentatively, with suitcases and a few books, and then, on the twenty-eighth, when you point out that they’ll be having to make a lot of trips back and forth if they really intend on staying for a while, everything else arrives. Sans takes the day to help (warning Papyrus to stay on the other side of the house and to keep Ghost with him, honestly, when the cat begins poking around the large doorway he’s set up in between houses), hauling boxes with good cheer. He probably could use another set of hands, but some of Alphys’ comics are risque enough that you understand instantly why Sans has banned Papyrus from helping. Alphys blushes, but is entirely unapologetic. 

You help too; changing into comfortable clothing and helping to box and carry things from Alphys’ cramped campus housing - your right arm can suddenly hold a lot! Undyne stares at you with undisguised jealousy when you scoop up one of her heavier weights to carry through the portal, and Sans smirks at her, clearly proud of you. She glares at him, and gets her revenge a little later by drawling that she and Alphys will be taking the bedroom furthest away from your own, all the way in the other wing by the lounge, since they value their sleep and don’t appreciate being kept up all night by horny skeletons. 

Sans doesn’t smirk after that, and finishes up the move rather quietly, not meeting your eyes. You, on the other hand, take the first opportunity you can to punch Undyne in the arm, hard, when you’re in private. She winces and jumps back. 

“What was that for!?” She’s all injured innocence. 

“For the ‘horny skeletons,’ jeez!” You say irritably. “A) I’m not a skeleton, and B), you didn’t need to make things more awkward!”

“Well, you’re part of a skeleton. Technically, you’re like, all skeleton, always have been, you just show a little more off than most people.” Undyne points out, awfully rationally. You narrow your eyes. “Besides, I thought everything was cool between you guys! I thought you were more in love then ever, right?” She snorts. “The way you were looking at each other over breakfast yesterday, eesh, I felt like I’d just eaten a bag of sugar just watching! Honestly, dude, I’m the one that just got engaged, and even I’m not that far on cloud nine.”

“We _are._ ” You hiss. “We’re fine. We just haven’t…” You flush, thinking back to that morning…

You’d woken up, blissful, in his arms, feeling well rested even though you’d spent most of the night talking; okay, maybe you were being a little insufferably in love, but, well, _his soul!_ He’d still been fast asleep, but when you shifted, he’d grumbled groggily and slid his hand onto your butt, made a growling, happy noise… and you’d just frozen, suddenly unable to think of anything but the thing he’d said the last time anything like this had happened; that he’d regretted it after the fact. He’d cracked his eyes open a second later, realized where his hand was, and pulled away quickly, looking absolutely mortified. You’d been trying to think of what to say, when he’d babbled something about seeing what Papyrus was up to and left abruptly - you’d never seen him get out of bed so fast!

“Haven’t…” Undyne prompts, bringing you back to reality, and you make a face. “Ah. Trouble in paradise.” She divines, and laughs. “Don’t worry, nerd, I’m sure you’ll bone again eventually.” She says, with a grin that makes you extend a particular skeletal finger towards her, glaring. “Oooh, flippin’ the skarm bird, _______’s getting tough on me now!” She snorts, and your eyes narrow again. 

“ _...Skarm?_ ” You whisper pointedly. Undyne realizes she’s gone a step too far. 

“Uh. Heh. Just something I’m t-trying out…” She stammers, reminding you an awful lot of Alphys. “Like… uh, skeleton arm, you know?”

“...Is everyone else calling it that?” You say, chewing over this new information. She winces. 

“Uh, everyone but, you know, Sans, we kinda thought he might throw us into the um, ocean a whole bunch of times if he thought we were teasing you…” You grimace. She’s not exactly wrong to have that fear, you suspect. You poke her right where you’d punched her, with the ...skarm in question. 

“He had better hear it from Frisk first, if you don’t want anyone to get in trouble. He’s more sensitive about it than I am right now, I think.” You warn her, stepping back through to her house for the last box of her stuff, and kind of regretting you’d given her the warning. Surely she could use a nice dip in the ocean to think about not teasing her dear and devoted friend. 

\-------------------------------------------------

Frisk and Toriel are still at your house, somewhat to your surprise. The queen had explained to you after Mettaton left, rather shyly, that Frisk was on vacation until the day after New Years, and that they’d begged to stay around to get to know you better. You’d assured her at once that you were so pleased to have Frisk around, and if there was anything she needed to get done, you would be happy to spend some time on babysitting duty. To your immense pleasure, Toriel had actually taken you up on the offer; she had lesson plans to write and a classroom to redecorate. 

So, you spend the twenty-ninth and the thirtieth of December mostly just bundled up and hanging out in the backyard with Frisk. Well, Frisk and Spot; those two have taken a shine to each other (though not half as much as Spot loves you, to be fair). 

You talk a lot about growing up with Paula, just wandering around the grounds. Frisk tells you their dad had never been in the picture, which is not a huge surprise to you. They’ve seen pictures, met him a few times, but the guy hadn’t ever bothered to learn to sign, not even the rudimentary ones Paula knows, so Frisk basically had no connection with him. You get the sense that Frisk wished that their dad had stuck around, all the same; they’d really suffered under Paula’s sole supervision. You’re beginning to realize how easy you’d gotten off. Paula might have smacked you around a few times, thrown a few plates at you, but you… well, you’d at least been older than Frisk was now. Frisk was just so small. God, what you wouldn’t give to spool back time, to be the person Frisk had deserved. You’d been here this whole time, in the same town, there’d been years and years you could have at least tried...

Sometimes it’s too hard for Frisk to talk. When that happens, you find a distraction. Frisk’s favorite one is to prank Sans - they figure out pretty early on that your right arm can really whip a snowball when you choose to do so, and they almost immediately point to the top of the house, at the curved bank of windows where Sans spends every free second when he’s not with you.

The first time you hit the window with a snowball, he’s down in a flash, jumping through a (messy, for him) doorway, eye sockets wide, labcoat half off, ready for a fight. 

You feel mildly horrified that your first thought upon seeing this is sort of along the lines of “ _hot damn._ ”

Frisk dissolves into laughter as you feel mildly guilty and shift from foot to foot. He groans, taking in the scene - you, blushing and doing your best to look innocent, Spot, shoved right up against your side and totally oblivious to anything but being near you, and Frisk, who has totally lost their chill laughing at the look on Sans’ face. 

“ _snow-most_ gave me a heart attack.” He finally snickers, and takes a few steps to give you a sweet, somewhat relieved kiss. That takes the wind out of Frisk’s sails; now that they’re getting more used to you, they have decided it’s downright disgusting that their cousin is kissing their uncle. Which, well, yeah… but!

“We are literally in no way related, Frisk, don’t be a baby.” You remind them over a chorus of **EWWW** s.

“ **Still gross.** ” Frisk insists, and has to dodge a noogie from Sans, laughing again. Sans shakes his head, muttering something under his breath, then looks up at Spot. 

“man, this girl really likes you, huh?” He muses, holding his palm out in front of the huge skull. Spot deigns to press her nose to his palm, chirping reservedly in your brain. She’s not a huge fan of him kissing you either - she’s wary around anyone big enough to potentially pose a threat to you.

“She’s got good taste.” You tease, and he grins.

“sure does.” Oh, damn it, when he smiles like that you still go all weak kneed and sentimental. 

Frisk groans again, and tosses a snowball at Sans’ head, and the rest of the afternoon passes in a pitched battle of snowy intensity, particularly when Papyrus and Undyne join in on the fun. 

\------------------------------------------

Sans doesn’t fall for the snowball trick again the next day, to Frisk’s (fine, and your own) disappointment. Frisk will have none of that, so you reluctantly say goodbye to Spot again to set up pranks inside, instead. 

… Is the door to the void getting harder to open? Oh, god. You’re not sure it is, but it feels like it might be, and you should… you should really probably be telling Sans about that, but you can’t bring yourself to. You’d spent the night, again, talking and cuddling, and neither of you had done anything less chaste than a kiss, particularly after the, uh, the butt incident. If his theory about why you’re suddenly so good at magic is even halfway correct, that’s something you’re really going to need to talk about sooner, rather than later, but even thinking about it just makes you want to turn red and crawl deep underground. 

You take a deep breath, and set to helping Frisk distribute their alarmingly huge collection of whoopie cushions around the house. To Frisk’s fury, Sans seems to have a preternatural ability to avoid whoopie cushions, which you discover when he comes down for a cup of coffee, picking the one stool that isn’t rigged. 

To Papyrus’ even greater fury, he sets off six in close succession, which leaves the taller skeleton nearly apoplectic on the floor of the kitchen, screaming about injustice while Lesser Dog rather gingerly gnaws on his femur in what seems to be a gesture of apology. You have to step outside the kitchen to laugh where Papyrus can’t see you and be further injured, tears streaming down your face. You jump when something brushes your back, but it’s just Sans, who’s smirking at you. 

“classic whoopie cushion prank. good work.” He tells you, and you try to compose yourself. 

“Why does Frisk even have so many?!” You groan, still shaking, and he grins, raising both eyebrow ridges. “Oh… oh, god, of course. I’m sure Toriel is so pleased with you.” You laugh. 

“she loves ‘em too. hey, question.” He says, still looking rather pleased with himself. 

“Sure.” You wipe your eyes once more, and try to regard him more seriously. 

“so, uh, tomorrow’s new year’s eve.”

“Yup.”

“and, big party here, right, monsters, humans, and so on…” He says, looking skeptical. You shrug and nod. 

“Yeah, that’s what Undyne’s planning, anyway, I’ve sorta just stayed out of the way.” You admit. 

“right. well, i mean, it’s a big date night, i guess, for humans … heh, i don’t know why i feel so nervous, we’re already dating, i just, uh, you wanna go out tonight, instead? somewhere nice? not grillbz?” He offers, looking a little bashful. You smile at him, your cheeks hurting from laughing so hard a second ago. 

“That sounds awesome. I’d love to.” Even if you hadn’t wanted to go out, the look on his face at that answer would have made it worth it. 

“heh. awesome.” He repeats. “i’ve, uh, i’ve actually got a surprise for you, so i thought maybe… well, you’ll see. k, say, sixish?” 

“Oh, um, wow. Sure!” You say, feeling awfully flattered, and a little nervous. 

“uh, cool. k, heading back up, stop by if you want to, you know, get alphys to sit on a whoopie cushion too.” He says with a brilliant smile, and steals a quick kiss before heading upstairs. You can practically feel the happiness radiating off him. 

A surprise.

You immediately head towards the other wing of the house. If anyone owes you several hours of picking over what _that_ could possibly mean, it’s Undyne. 

After all, you’d even heard Toriel say “skarm” this morning. 

She definitely owes you one.


	53. In Which You Have a Really Awful Date

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love you. 
> 
> Come visit [your mom.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

“He’s totally gonna propose.”

“You shut your mouth!” You glare viciously at Undyne, who smirks at you. You’re sitting cross-legged on the foot of her bed, cuddling Ghost on your lap. 

“Just sayin’. He wants a surprise date, all of a sudden-”

“A MONTH, UNDYNE. We’ve known each other a MONTH. This is literally our second date!” You groan. 

“Uh, have you _seen_ how he looks at you?” She drawls. “He’s gonna propose.” 

“Oh god.” You have a terrible, sinking feeling in your stomach, remembering the day he’d helped you into the shower. “He did make a joke about ring shopping once. I mean, I think it was a joke??”

“Probably not a joke.” Undyne grins hugely, enjoying your discomfort. When you still look horrified, she rolls her eyes, looking, if anything, disappointed in you. “Oh, c’mon, buddy, he’s not really gonna propose, I was teasing. You’ve known each other a month. He’s not that thick-skulled.” She assures you.

“Really?” You whisper, still feeling anxious. 

“Really.” 

“If he proposes, I’m gonna punch him. Skarm style.” You threaten, and she snickers. 

“Don’t worry. It’s okay.” She pulls both legs up onto her bed, then her eyes widen. “Unless-”

“Oh, god, what.”

“...You think he’s pregnant?” She whispers, the evil light in her eyes flaring up again. You groan, burying your face in your hands as she cackles. 

“You think you’re hilarious, but you’re the exact opposite.” You grumble. “You’re a huge jerk, that’s all, and I think you’ve been letting Alphys read too much Harry Potter fanfic to you.” She smirks, but doesn’t deny it. Alphys and Undyne have gone in _deep_ into Harry Potter over the past few days. “But seriously, I have no idea…”

“Maybe he’s gonna tell you he thinks it’s time to get back to business.” She proposes, then waggles her eyebrows. “You know. Like. _Busin-_ ”

“YES, I KNOW.” You groan. “He could just tell me that now, he doesn’t need to take me anywhere to do that. But…” 

“What?” She catches the genuine conflict on your face, and stops grinning, looking a little concerned. 

“I don’t know, just… I kinda like this?” You admit. “Where we’re at right now? I mean, we were moving so fast, and now we’re kinda… catching up on the stuff we missed out on, you know? I feel like I’ve learned more about him in the past four days than I had the entire time before that. Like, did you know that he’s never had peanut butter? Seriously. Just never occurred to him to have it. And did you know that he plays the trombone? Which, by the way, I’m pretty damn sure he does just so that he can make trom-bone jokes?” You laugh, and Undyne groans. 

“I never thought of that.” 

“Yeah. He’s good, though!” You say quickly. “He’d only play a little for me, but he’s good!”

“...Well, that explains the horn section coming from your room last night, I suppose.” Undyne laughs. “So, if you’re having fun, what’s the problem?” You hesitate, then grimace. 

“I’m, um, worried that my arm will fall off?” 

“COME AGAIN?” Undyne says, looking delighted once more, then mutters, “Sorry, that was probably not polite, given your current, uh, lack of, fuhuhuhu, com-”

“DON’T.” You glare at her again, then grimace at your arm. “I don’t know, dude. This thing is kinda held together by magic and, um… whatever this thing is, whatever Sans’ dad did…” You gesture vaguely at the black disc that delineates your flesh from bone, trying not to touch it. You’d learned very quickly that touching it was enormously uncomfortable, even if the rest of the, ugh, skarm, was more or less fine (if still a little sensitive). “Just…” You take a deep breath. “What if I run out? Like, if we’re all right, and I’ve been able to do this stuff because… you know.” 

“Magic c-”

“Yes.” You take a deep breath. “Dude… I like my arm! I want it to stay in one piece! Or, you know, many pieces, but still a cohesive unit!” Undyne snorts. 

“Look, he’s not gonna let things get dire, if that’s even what’s happening. I mean, are you feeling okay?” You take a moment and consider this. 

“More or less. Maybe a little tired when I let Spot out.” You confess. She makes a face. 

“Void magic man. Ugh. Gives me goosebumps, uh, no offense. You sure you don’t just wanna learn how to make a spear? I mean, you’re still new at this, you haven’t settled on any attack or anything, right? We could just make you a Mini-Undyne.” She proposes, and it’s your turn to snort. 

“Oh? I thought that’s why you proposed to Alphys, so you could make lots and lots of Mini-Undyne-”

“SHUT IT!” Undyne growls, reaching for a pillow. You hop quickly off the bed, unwilling to let this whole thing degrade into a pillow fight. 

“I’m gonna go get changed, it’s five already. I’ll tell you how it goes.” You tell her with a laugh, and she gives you a grin. 

“If you come back with a ring, I swear, I’ll never stop making fun of you-”

“Goodbye, Undyne!” 

\---------------------------------------------

You go up to your room and paw through the new wardrobe that Mettaton’s provided you, wishing that everything didn’t need to be shrouded in such secrecy when it came to Sans. Sans loved secrets, though, or rather, he loved the big moment where he got to reveal them, so you decided not to go down and badger him for the restaurant name in an effort to make sure you were properly dressed. You’d just look nice. 

You eventually pick out a cap sleeved black dress that hits your knees- black goes with everything, right? It’s a very flattering cut, of course (thanks, Mettaton!). More importantly - it had pockets. You can’t help but wish the robot was with you to help you with your hair and makeup, but you do your best, traipsing into the bathroom, and looking at your arm helplessly in the mirror for a moment, trying to decide if it looks weird, if you should put a glove on or something. 

Well, it does look weird, but, you decide, it’s you now. You can’t hide it forever, so why hide it at all? Hell, if people were going to look anyway…

You find the silver cuff in your jewelry box, way in the bottom drawer, in the back. It was an old thing, a treasured thing - your mom had picked it out for you when a trip for work had led her to a month in the Navajo Nation. It had stopped fitting you once you turned maybe eleven, twelve, but now… 

It slides on like it was designed for your arm. 

You’re feeling a little smug about this, sitting on the edge of your bed and slipping on some awfully cute black shoes, when Sans walks in, looking worried. 

“i don’t think i have nice shoes.” He says instantly, and you burst out laughing. Then, he gets a good look at you, and he takes a step forward, almost against his will, then blinks and stammers, “uh, you look… i mean… oh god, you look, you’re…”

“Pretty?” You suggest, giving him your best ‘pretty’ smile.

“not good enough.” He says, shaking his head. “you’re… gotta say, babe, my vocab doesn’t fail me too often…” You snicker, standing up and looking him over. He’s doing his best to dress up, honestly, but nice clothes seem to react to him the same way oil does with water. You walk over, and deliberately straighten his dress shirt so it hangs properly on his shoulders, and get his tie in order as well, then nod at the suit jacket in his arms. “Put that on, I’ll see if I can find some shoes for you in your room.” You murmur, then, unable to help yourself, lean to give him a quick kiss. He looks much less stressed over that, and is wrestling the suit jacket on while you walk next door, where all his clothes are still stored, to find some shoes. 

He has a pair of shoes that could pass for nice, if nobody looked too closely - well, he’s got one shoe, at least, it takes you ages to find the other one (it ends up being wedged into the pages of a monster textbook about humans, as a makeshift bookmark). His room is absolute chaos, but you have to admit, you kind of love it. After Paula, seeing a room in an untidy state gives you a guilty, delighted thrill. 

“Here, found some.” You tell him, walking back into your room. He blinks at you, sees the shoes in your hands, then sighs with relief. 

“thought i left those in snowdin. lifesaver.” He says, putting them on quickly, without socks. “k, you ready to go?”

“Almost.” You laugh, and give him a hand up to his feet, giving him a slow, deliberate kiss when he’s found his balance. “Okay, ready.” You murmur, and he gives you a look like maybe he’s not ready, after all that. He swallows, seems to gather his resolve after an extremely fleeting glance to the bed that somehow manages to make you flush all the way down to your toes, and mutters, 

“k.” Then, more elegantly than you’ve ever seen him do so, he draws a doorway to, well, elsewhere, in the middle of your bedroom. You stare at it for a second, then smile at Sans and step through (ignoring the keening delight and immediate despair from Spot as you pass through the doorway for a split second, and she recognizes your presence in the space between). Sans steps after you, and you blink, looking around. 

“Woah, uh, where are we?” Sans gives you a guilty laugh. 

“uh, the new restaurant in Mettaton’s casino in Vegas. know you love those high-end cooking shows, so …”

“Are you kidding me?” You hiss, glancing around at the opulent, silver and pink decor, all of it positively dripping, well, Mettaton. “I thought that this was a Gordon Ramsay restaurant?!”

“uh, dunno who that is? maybe? mettaton said he’d hook us up.” Sans says with a lazy shrug, and you let out a soft whimper.

“...If I see Gordon Ramsay, I’ll actually die. Understand? There will be none of me left. I will explode.” You warn him, and he grins wide and eager, understanding just how hugely he’s succeeded. 

“heh. kay. c’mon, we’ve got reservations.” 

“D’you think he’s cooking here tonight? Oh my god, do you think he made beef wellington? Sans. Sans. Do you think the Masterchef Junior kids are here, because-”

“c’mon, ________.” 

You take a moment to gather yourself, grab his hand, and allow yourself to be escorted into the best date you could have possibly imagined. 

\---------------------------------

Several hours later, you are absolutely weak with laughter. Not at all weak with hunger; Sans definitely has that covered. They serve an _eighteen course_ tasting meal, including the famous Beef Wellington, and Sans actually, gamely, tries most of it - though his heart is really in the drink pairings and the one fire-roasted tomato and fiddlehead puree (with creme fraiche, truffles and osetra caviar) that you’ll probably be tasting in your dreams for the rest of your life. 

Everything’s been so perfect; you’ve been secluded enough in a corner booth to make you feel like a VIP, without making you feel like you have to hide. The waitress compliments your bracelet twice, even bringing over another woman to look at it, without once mentioning the skeletal arm it’s attached to. Your sommelier is actually a small, irritable fire elemental, not a human, who makes absolutely impeccable wine suggestions, all on the house at Mettaton’s request. By the time that the waitress brings out the final course of desserts, you’re stuffed, tired, and just a little tipsy.

“Sans. The surprise?” You finally ask, boldly, when you realize that he’s perfectly content to sit back and watch you eat the truffles that the (comped) check has been served with, a slightly hungry look on his face. 

“oh! fuck!” He’s probably more than a little tipsy, too, since he hasn’t been eating as much. All the same, he immediately reaches for his pocket. 

For a heartstopping second, you think he’s going for a ring box, and your hand curls up into a fist in spite of yourself. Then he plops it on the table… it’s a much used journal that you immediately recognize. 

“Dad’s journal.” You mutter, squinting at the book, and glance up at Sans. “What?” 

“so… i’ve spent the last few days looking through the stuff your parents were working on. figured i’d pick up where they left off. least i could do, since i get to work in a lab like that.” He says, and looks at you, admiringly. “babe, your parents… smart, it doesn’t cover it. i’m in awe. they were interested in _everything_.” He murmurs, reverent. “no wonder i love you so much. no wonder you’re such a wonderful person. god, they just… look, if we knew humans could have been like that, underground, i don’t think… i don’t know what i’m saying. just, they were good, good people.” 

“They were the best.” You confirm quietly. “Sans, god, I wish you coulda met them, I swear, they would have loved you, they’d have practically adopted you, okay? Like, they just… they weren’t scared of anything, ever, especially anything different. They would have loved you.” You repeat, and he grins, sheepish. 

“god, i hope so.” He whispers, then shakes his head. “anyway, forget me. look.” He opens the journal to a page that unfolds to two pages, then four, then six, a complicated, bifurcating diagram that looks oddly familiar…

“A family tree?” You guess, and he nods.

“ _your_ family tree.” He says. “scooch over, look.” You comply, inching down the bench seat of the corner booth you’re in until you’re right by his side. “look, here’s you, and here’s where frisk would be.” He points out, showing you the diagram. “here’s your parents, and your dad’s parents, and … look, all the way up here…” He traces his way, generation after generation up the tree, and indicates an ancestor of origin, someone your dad must have been deliberately tracing back to, because there’s her name, all the way up there, “Calista,” and then, scribbled in red, in your father’s cramped script, right underneath, “SORCERESS.” 

“What?” You whisper, and Sans smiles gently, wrapping his arm around your back. 

“looks like you come from a long line, babe.” He whispers. “i mean, all of your dad’s stuff, all of it, all of his work on the barrier, it’s all about one question - where did the magic come from originally, to make the barrier in the first place? and, based on this… it looks like it was part of you and your family this whole time, that ability to do magic. i don’t understand all of it. don’t understand half of it, not yet, but… it’s beginning to get clearer, why you and frisk can do stuff no other human can do.” He gives you a shy smile. “you’re special, _________. you’re so special. and your mom and dad left all this stuff for you, trying to figure out how that specialness works, and i’m gonna help too. we’re gonna figure this out together.” You pause, gathering your emotions. 

“Holy shit.” You finally mutter, feeling partially delighted, partially awestruck. This is… well, it’s such a gift. It’s like your mom and dad had reached out to give you one last thing, like you’d had one last conversation with them. “Sans, baby, this is… god, this is so amazing.” Sans grins. 

“yeah. but… babe, your parents loved you so much. they wanted you to have this, no matter what. know how I know?” He breathes.

“How?” You ask quietly. He doesn’t say anything, just folds up the family tree with painstaking precision, then flips to the front of the journal, laying the inscription open. 

“To our darling ________, may you never stop questioning, never stop seeking, never stop fighting, until all barriers have been torn to the ground. Your loving parents, Mom and Dad.” You read, and are embarrassed to feel your throat swell with pending tears. “Sans… I can’t…. I never even thought….” You whisper, suddenly wanting nothing more than for him to know why you’d never seen this in the first place, why you'd been too worried and emotional to even step into the lab, much less read through the work your brilliant parents had left behind. He shakes his head.

“the two of us, we’re gonna figure this all out. magic, energy, your family… what happened to your parents. deal?” He whispers, and you realize, for the first time, that he’s not buying the party line, that your parents’ car had hit ice and sailed into the sea twelve years ago. No, you think, looking into the tiny bright lights that demark his pupils, he’s not buying that at all. 

“Deal.” You hear yourself say, shakily.


	54. In Which Nobody is At All Frustrated

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [WELL THIS IS GREAT](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138902304546/submitted-by-donchakno-hey-mom-i-got-more-art)
> 
> God, I love you kids.

The check is taken away, two elegant flutes of champagne are put in its place, and the sommelier beams and crackles at you as you try to wrap your mind around the last few minutes. Sans is eyeing you carefully. 

“babe, sorry, didn’t mean to upset…” He mutters, and you shake your head. 

“No apologies. This is wonderful. I mean, it’s a lot. I guess I knew, I mean, they worked at the barrier, I knew they had to be researching magic on some level...” You whisper, your hand caressing the familiar leather cover of your dad’s journal. “This is… god, I just have so many questions. If my family is magic, why didn’t my dad ever use any? Why can I, or Frisk?” Sans smiles slightly. 

“dunno. got some guesses. we’ll do some tests. plenty to keep us busy, next few weeks.” He says, giving your hand a reassuring squeeze. 

“Tests?” You say, a little apprehensively. He looks to the heavens for guidance. 

“don’t worry. nothing embarrassing or painful or anything.” He assures you. “jeez, babe, ‘m not gonna bite.” Your eyes travel unconsciously to his mouth, or rather, his teeth.

“Too bad.” You sigh under your breath, not really thinking about anything other than the tragedy that his mouth hasn’t been anywhere near your neck for the past few days… then you suddenly remember exactly who you’re talking to. His expression hasn’t changed, but his pupils are suddenly brighter, more intense, and for the time being, you find yourself struggling to think about anything besides him. 

“think i like tipsy you.” He mutters to himself after a moment, then laughs. “hell, think i like every version of you.”

“Hm?” You snuggle a little closer, looking up at him through your eyelashes. You know what you’re doing, and, given the soft laugh he gives you, so does he. “Which versions are you talking about?” He swallows, and reaches haphazardly for his champagne glass, downing half of the flute in a gulp. 

“uh, well, there’s happy you. i like her.” He drawls, at last. “and excited you. and annoyed you is pretty, heh, hot, gotta admit.” You narrow your eyes at that, and he grins. “yeah, exactly.” He says, which makes you come up short, since he apparently enjoys that glare. You wait for him to say more, and he seems awfully tempted, his eyes lingering all sorts of places that his eyes shouldn’t be, not when you’re in public.

“D’you wanna go home, Sans?” You finally murmur, running a bony finger over his jaw. He takes a second to collect himself after that, and you let him, sipping at your champagne glass as he distractedly pockets your dad’s journal once more. 

“please.” He finally agrees, sounding a little wound up. In your current state, all you can think of is how much you want to help him, er, relax. Unwind. Forget moving slow, forget catching up for lost time, you are just stupid in love with him (and a little drunk!) and you want to make him happy. He looks like he might very well be on the same page; you like the look on his face right now very much. He slides from the booth, and you follow suit, glancing back at the table one last time. Your sense of gratitude gets the better of you, and you clear your throat. 

“Sans, this was the best date I’ve ever, ever… I never thought I’d be somewhere like this.” You tell him honestly, before you get too distracted to make sure he knows that. “I especially never thought I’d be somewhere like this with someone as… as amazing as you.” He’s smiling shyly now, the heated look off his face for the moment. 

“me too.” He says, low and quiet, then grins. “glad you liked it, babe, i think i need to give mettaton my firstborn or something, said i’d owe ‘im big time, but totally worth it.” You snicker at that.

“Aw, don’t worry, baby, I won’t let him Rumplestiltzkin you.” You tease, and he chuckles, taking your hand - he seems to be carefully alternating between the one made of flesh and blood, and the one made of bone, to ensure that there’s no hint of favoritism - and leading you out into the casino proper, then down a side hall where it’s safe to make a doorway right back to your bedroom. You step through (hi Spot, bye Spot, sorry!) and smile slowly at him when he joins you, the door to the casino snapping shut behind him in an instant. He’s so good at that. He’s so good at so many things. “So.” You say, sinking to a seat on the foot of the bed and taking your shoes off. 

“so.” He grins at you and sits down next to you, shrugging off his suit jacket and doing the same, seemingly feeling much better the less fancy his outfit is. Oh, you’ll have to take him to a dive bar or something next time, since he’s been so willing to put himself through discomfort for the sake of making you happy. He loosens his tie, and you swallow, feeling that he looks much better like this, mildly dishevelled and in what appears to be an excellent mood. Still, he doesn’t move any closer, and after a minute of this, you try to take a stab as to why. 

“So, uh… just to be clear… when I… freaked out? Um, at you the other day, I was kinda going through a lot of stuff? Like, um, the skarm and everything-” He arches an eyebrow ridge - he doesn’t love the term “skarm,” even though it’s grown on you, you have to admit. “Well, heh, you know. But, um, I’m totally past that. I am so far removed from being mad. I get why you said what you said. I know you were just trying to look out for me.”

“uh… good.” He suddenly sounds strained, like he has to force out the word, and you study him. 

“Sans, what’s wrong?” You ask, quieter. He takes a moment to collect himself, then groans. 

“uh… just that it would, fuck, it would… it would be smarter to wait a while.” He says, extraordinarily unwillingly, like saying those words is causing him physical pain. You blink, feeling a little caught off guard (and more than a little disappointed). “just for another day or two, just… look, babe, i am real unhappy about this.” He mutters. “i am a little drunk, and you’re looking like… that, and there is literally nothing on this earth i want more than to take you and-” He stops talking abruptly, perhaps realizing that he’s not on a productive path. “we just don’t know enough.” He says quietly. “i gotta know you’ll be okay, or come up with a game plan, or something… look, it’s all immaterial, right? i plan to be around as long as you’ll have me. so, hopefully, uh, none of this will matter, but if we do need to spend some time, uh, apart…” He groans, rubbing the back of his neck. “gotta make sure you’re not gonna get hurt in my absence. also. don’t want you to ever feel like you’re stuck with me, you know? gotta just… figure out how you’re staying in one piece now, make sure you stay that way, without my, uh-”

“Help.” You supply, and he lets out a low laugh. 

“not exactly what i was gonna say, but sure.” He says, trying to hide a guilty, slightly evil smile and looking down at his feet. You just know that there’s hundreds of jokes he’s just desperate to make, that you’re sure he’s already thought of, that he’s absolutely certain you’ll kill him for even thinking.

“Sans…” You murmur, and he looks at you, all wide eyes and worry, and you feel cripplingly guilty for snapping at him the other day. While he might lack some tact, his intentions are always, always good.

“but hey, look, uh, we could um, we could do non-magic stuff, k, just cuz, uh, gettin’ me off involves magic doesn’t mean that you gotta-” He begins, wild for a solution that’ll leave you happy. 

“Shh.” You say quickly, and give him a soft kiss before he can stammer out anything else. “I’m not gonna yell at you again, Sans. I’m so sorry I made you feel like you needed to be nervous about - look, you’re doing me a huge favor right now.” You assure him. “Like, a hundred favors, actually.” Seeing how upset he looks makes you realize just how much self-control it’s taking for him to be so noble. “I get it. We need to learn more about how all this works. You don’t want me, uh, falling apart.”

“literally the only reason.” He says quickly. “you have no idea how much i wanna-”

“I _definitely_ have an idea.” You sigh reluctantly, and the two of you share a conspiratorial, longing glance before you burst out laughing. “Oh… man. Okay. We’ll be good. I’m, um, gonna go get changed in the bathroom, then we can go to bed. Because if we’re being good, I am wearing some underwear that would definitely be unfair to show you right now.” You say, standing up. He groans quietly, in an astonishing amount of distress, and you realize that it had probably been unfair to say that, too. “Uh, sorry!” You say, walking quickly to the bathroom, scooping up some shorts and a t-shirt to change into, and taking the moment by yourself to try to cool down. You’d feel so much more disappointed if it wasn’t so painfully clear that this was an act of love from him, this restraint. And, well, he was right. You couldn’t just count on him being there to… fill up the tank, you decide euphemistically. No matter what he said, he had to feel free to leave you. He couldn’t just stay forever because you were leeching, quite literally, off him. Because everybody left, and maybe he would, too, sweet words and all, but you weren’t going to keep him on a leash to keep him with you…

You quickly splash some water on your face, composing yourself. Stop being defeatist, _______. He said he intended to stick around. He was just trying to take care of you, and that was okay. You were allowed to enjoy that. In spite of everything Paula had told you, you were deserving of care. 

When you walk back into the bedroom, only the bedside lamp is on, and he’s under the covers in what is assuredly another novelty shirt. He looks at you and sighs. 

“not fair. still hot.” He grumbles, and you have to giggle at his displeasure at this development as you climb in next to him. 

“If you’re so upset, you’ve got a perfectly good bed in the other room…” You point out, and he shakes his head quickly. 

“nope, happy here.” He insists, switching off the lamp and curling to your side, all warm, bony angles. You sigh, and wrap an arm around him, nuzzling his neck - his, er, cervical vertebrae, you were trying to learn the names a little better. 

“Would you call these cervical vertebrae?” You muse out loud. 

“i call ‘em neck bones.” He says with a laugh, and you roll your eyes. A comfortable silence stretches between you, and eventually, you speak up again. 

“Hey, Sans?” 

“mm?” He sounds sleepy, but you can tell from the way he’s holding you that he isn’t anywhere near sleep. Faker. 

“What you said at the restaurant, about… you know, about figuring out what happened to my parents. What did you mean?” You whisper. “I mean… you know they died, right, they um… they recovered their bodies, eventually.” Oh, you are not great at pillowtalk. This has just been scratching at the back of your head ever since he said it, and now, without distractions, you can’t help but ask.

“yeah, i know. looked it up online.” Sans mutters, his arm tightening protectively around you, and you wonder if he’s thinking the same thing as you are. It had taken a while, too long, for the dive teams to locate the car and get them out in the icy waters that winter, but the ocean was still the ocean, and the animals that lived there had been busy. They hadn’t been suitable to show you for identification purposes - they’d had to check dental records, a fact Paula had drunkenly told you a month or so later. Thinking of that gruesome reality, of the fact that your parents had been more bone than flesh themselves, by the time they were pulled out of the water… you shudder slightly, in spite of yourself, thinking of the void, the stench of entropy that still billowed from it, the sense of things falling apart that persisted whenever you looked too hard at it, touched it for too long. Sans senses your distress, even with your head still tucked under his, and strokes your back slowly, soothingly. 

When he speaks again, his voice is much more gentle. “i don’t get everything that they were doing up there, _______. not in their lab here, not by the barrier, but i’ve seen the design for the turbine, and they were doing stuff with energy and magic conversion that i was only just getting into, before frisk showed up. they had the turbine up by the time you were two, ‘s twenty years ago that they had figured out how to draw power from the barrier, not just a prototype, a totally working machine. they were miles ahead of me, and that was twenty damn years ago.” He says. A lesser man would sound jealous. He sounds awestruck. “i think… i think they were close, to taking the barrier down. i really do.” He whispers. “i think they were close, and i think that a lot of people were ready to write off that car crash as an accident before they even started investigating.” He pauses for a second, letting you digest that, his hand tracing your spine. 

“Why don’t you think it was a crash?” You finally whisper. “The roads are dangerous when they’re icy up there, everyone knows it.”

“yeah.” He says quietly. “so, i mean, i thought the timing seemed a little suspicious. can’t figure out their notes, exactly, but i mean, in the journal, he even says it, he thought it was gonna be months, maybe less, before the barrier fell. but people have accidents all the time.” He takes a deep, deep breath, then shifts his head back so he can meet your eyes. “you ok?”

“Yeah. Yeah. Tell me what’s up, Sans.” You insist, all the distractions from before, the lust, the alcohol, the sheer giddiness suddenly just background noise. You’re regarding him with a sudden clarity, realizing the amount of thought he’s been putting into this while you’ve been outside, playing in the snow. He swallows - you can hear the sound, even though you’re sure there’s no reason for him to do so; it’s such a human tic that you almost want to stop this line of questioning and just spend some more time adoring him, but you don’t. He’s answering questions, as best as he can, and they’re questions you hadn’t dared ask out loud, not ever. 

“like you said. it took a long time to find the car. d’you know why?” Sans whispers, and you nod. 

“It was winter. Hard to search in the cold-”

“no. it’s because the car wasn’t where it should have been.” He mutters. “for them to have slipped on the ice and gone off, where the skidmarks were, where the guardrail came down… they shoulda been closer to shore, they shoulda been hundreds of feet east from where they found the car.”

“Tides. It moved.” You suggest weakly, and he pauses.

“maybe. you remember that car though? suv. not a light car. not easy to move. and… look, fluid mechanics, not my speciality, but i’ve looked at the maps of the coast there, and i popped over to check it out, and it just seems like, if the tides woulda carried it anywhere, i think it woulda been in the other direction.” He mutters. “but even then. wasn’t deep, just deep enough to stay under at low tide. and it was stuck on rocks, don’t know how it woulda moved in the first place. lotta things aren’t adding up, babe.” He says, and shakes his head, slowly. “i aim to find out why.” 

You know him, you know him to the center of his soul, you know that nothing makes Sans rouse from his act of being lazy more than the problem, the intellectual challenge that the word “why” presents, but this time, you can tell, it’s not a game for him, it’s not for fun. He’s furious on your behalf, on your parents’ behalf, and maybe (a little) on his own behalf, for the decade spent underground that he believes wouldn’t have happened if your parents had lived just a little longer. 

And you trust him. You trust him enough to believe him when he confides these suspicions, even though that belief is already opening up wounds that you thought had closed a long, long time ago. After all, you’re furious too. For your mom and dad. For Frisk. For all of your friends from the underground, all the children that had died in Asgore’s miserable effort to escape. And for yourself, god, for the suffering you’d endured when your entire universe disappeared overnight, in one fell swoop that seemed to indicate nothing more than the world being a cruel, capricious, malicious place. 

“Sans, I love you.” You whisper, and he squeezes you tightly. 

“love you too. just wish… wish this had all worked out differently. wish i’d been able to tell ‘em how smart they were, what a wonderful human they’d raised…” He whispers, and you gulp and nod, thinking that it’s not quite fair, that he holds your parents in such esteem, that you hold Gaster in such low regard, and that you’d been the one to be visited by his parent, post-mortem, and not the other way around. 

“I wish that too.” You mutter. “God, I really do.” He sighs, then kisses you roughly, hungrily, all his passion and desire and love in the singular gesture. You close your eyes and cling to him, trying not to go limp. You’re breathing very hard by the time he stops kissing you, and you have more than half a mind to protest. 

“fuck, i love you.” He breathes, kissing you once more, fleetingly. 

“W-we should probably go to bed.” Your voice is embarrassingly shaky, and he senses your weakness like a predator gets the scent of blood, his smile growing wider, before he remembers himself and pointedly, deliberately, relaxes his hold just a little. 

“yeah. you’re right. night, babe.”

“Night, Sans.”

It takes a long time for either of you to fall asleep. 

\---------------------------

You awake from a dream that was in absolutely no way wholesome, into a scene that is similarly lacking in some... whole? You’re not sure if that’s how wholesomeness works, altogether, but you’re also pretty sure, under the circumstances, that you should definitely not be considered an authority. 

Sans is asleep, and it’s a damn good thing he is, because if he was awake, you would probably have to punch him. After all, you definitely hadn’t fallen asleep like… like this! He’s got a hand up your shirt, which would be bad enough, if it weren’t for the fact that he is clearly - clearly - also having a very good dream, which has manifested in him pressing _hard_ against your butt, occasionally rocking his hips and releasing a soft groan each time.

For a few moments, you lie there, paralyzed. Then, very guiltily, you determine that a good part of your paralysis stems from the fact that you’re kind of (really?) enjoying this. Oh god. You should move. Any second now, you’re going to move.

He lets out a slightly louder groan, this time inarguably containing your name. You scramble away, quickly, waking him in the process.

“wha-” He says blearily. 

“I NEED AN ADULT.” You say without thinking, scooting out of bed and rearranging your shirt. He does a double take at that one, then takes stock of his ...situation, then slowly, deliberately, pulls the covers up over his head, letting out a much less happy sounding groan.

“...sorry?” The pile of blankets on your bed finally enunciates. 

“We need a chaperone.” You mutter, feeling uncomfortably warm. “I’m, um… getting chang-… I’m going downstairs. Uh. Yep.” 

“‘s so early, though.” He peeks an eye out, and you glare at him.

“You _know_ what will happen if I get back in bed.” You say flatly, trying to ignore the pounding of your heart. 

“heh.” The blankets snicker. You glare at him - this whole damn thing was his idea! - grab an outfit at random from the dresser, and stalk into the bathroom to change, breathing hard. Oh, until he’s certain that he knows what’s going on with you, that you won’t dissolve just because you’ve been cut off from the apparent source of your magic, you need someone to get right in between the two of you.

Luckily, there’s someone that you’re absolutely certain fits the bill entirely in this house, and he, out of everyone, is probably already awake. You’ve just barely changed and stepped out into the hall when an excited scream fills your ears, followed by a clatter of bones.

“HAPPY NEW YEARS’ EVE, HUMAN!” He yelps, and you give him a big, relieved smile. 

“Papyrus, I’ve never been so happy to see you. Want breakfast?”

You ignore the disconsolate grumble from your room as you and Paps traipse downstairs.


	55. In Which The Most Important Thing That Happens Is That Everyone Eats Popovers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this chapter's late, it kinda got away from me. 
> 
> On the upside(?), it's very long!
> 
> Which is what she said!!!!

“_________, YOU’RE UP VERY EARLY, FOR A HUMAN!” Papyrus sounds thrilled. You snort. 

“Think it’s pretty early for anyone, Paps. Sun’s barely up.” You yawn, walking over to the cabinet and grabbing a coffee filter and the canister of dark roast, plopping quite a few scoops into the paper filter. Papyrus watches with interest, hovering behind you.

“WELL, I’M VERY HAPPY TO BE ABLE TO SPEND SOME TIME WITH YOU AND LEARN HUMAN COOKING TIPS!” He says, beaming, and you grin up at him, rubbing your eye sleepily. 

“Yeah, Paps. Mmph, sorry.” You yawn, then stretch slowly. “I haven’t been hanging out with you so much, huh?”

“WELL, YOU’VE BEEN BUSY WITH MY BROTHER.” Papyrus says with a shrug, and you try not to frown, filling the carafe with water. You have been the exact opposite of busy with Sans, that’s the whole - “SO, YOU BOIL THE BROWN STUFF, THEN RUN IT THROUGH A STRAINER?” He peers at the coffee maker. “COFFEE IS BASICALLY PASTA.” He determines, and you burst out laughing. 

“Mhm. Basically.” You agree, filling the reservoir and starting the machine. “Okay, bud, what d’you wanna make for breakfast?”

“CAN YOU TEACH ME SOMETHING NEW?” Papyrus sounds tentative, and you can’t help but grin at him again. 

“Sure.” You yawn again, giving him a sleepy smile when you’re done, and he narrows his eyes at you. 

“SANS IS RUBBING OFF ON YOU.” You’re suddenly very glad that you aren’t drinking coffee, or you would have choked. Yeah, Sans had certainly _tried_ to rub off on you… 

“Just didn’t get that much sleep.” You say quickly, trying not to blush. “Hm, how about some popovers, bud? My mom and dad taught me how to make ‘em when I was a kid. They’re tasty!” 

“GREAT IDEA! YOU’RE VERY SMART, HUMAN. POPOVERS ARE THE BEST! WHAT ARE THEY?” Papyrus is always a fountain of enthusiasm. You chuckle, quickly grab a cup of coffee while the carafe is still filling (letting some splash on the heating plate, to Papyrus’ delight), and then break out the eggs, flour and milk to get started. 

Undyne and Alphys stroll into the kitchen by the time the popovers are in the oven, in pajamas and looking awfully cuddly. Undyne raises an eyebrow when she sees you, already up and on your second cup of coffee.

“Hands.” She demands, and you hold both hands up, groaning, to confirm that there are no new rings. She lets out a huff of something that’s either satisfaction or disappointment, and you have to chuckle. Papyrus stares at you, mystified, as Alphys snickers, then he reaches very slowly towards your coffee cup, trying to sneak a sip. 

“Oh, heck no.” You swat his hand. “Told you, you can have coffee if Sans says it’s okay, but you’ve already got more than enough energy.” Papyrus looks sulky at that, particularly when Undyne smirks and pours herself a mug, locking eyes with Papyrus as she takes a sip and makes an exaggerated “mmm” noise. “You’re being mean.” You tell Undyne, sighing, and begin washing some strawberries, thinking that a fruit salad would probably be pretty good with breakfast. 

Toriel and Frisk come downstairs next, L.D. trotting at Frisk’s side. You wave at them and chuckle when both immediately, without asking, get to work washing and cutting fruit as the kitchen fills with happy chatter. It’s only when there’s only a few popovers left and everyone’s lingering over their plates that Undyne drawls, 

“Where’s the bonehead, anyway? He’s usually up by now.” You shrug, she arches an eyebrow, and you chuckle, swatting Papyrus’ hand again; he’s going for the last sip of coffee in your mug while he thinks you’re distracted. 

“I’ll go check on him. If he’s not up by now, I’ll send you in to wake him, Paps.” You promise with a laugh, and grab an extra cup of coffee to bring up to him, thinking that it might serve as an enticement to get out of bed. When you get up to your room, though, the bed is empty - he’s actually made it, which is sweet of him, and awfully out of character. “Hm.” You mutter, and then trudge up to the only other likely location, two floors up. 

Sans whips his head around when he hears the door to the lab open, then relaxes. 

“hey babe.”

“Hey, you didn’t come down for breakfast.” You say. “Gotta eat something today, okay? Brought you some coffee for now, though.”

“oh, thank god.” He walks right over, grabbing the mug and downing a big gulp. “hey, stay put, i was gonna ask you to come up in a minute, anyway.” He could only have been up here for the hour and a half or so since you’d last seen him, but he looks like he’s totally focused right now. 

“Uh, sure. Whatcha doin’?” You ask, hopping up onto one of the chairs by a desk and wishing you’d thought to top off your own coffee before you came up. He turns to look at you with a faint smile. 

“figuring stuff out.” 

“Be more vague.” You drawl, turning your mug over to try to get the last drop out. He sighs, walks over, splashes half of his coffee in your mug, then walks back to a machine on the other side of the room. 

“remember how i said i was gonna figure out what this does?” He says, placing a reverent hand on the device. 

“Yup.” You grin, taking another sip. 

“think i figured it out.” He steps back to look at it. It’s a little taller than a refrigerator, a sleek gray box with dials and switches. At the top, an arm sticks out, suspending a black dome like an upturned colander several feet into the room. “‘member how you couldn’t see souls at first.” 

“Uh, yeah, that was like ... a second ago.” You say dryly, exaggerating (but only slightly). He turns to grin at you. 

“you’re cranky this morning.” 

“Three guesses why, asshole.” You arch an eyebrow, and he has the good grace to look guilty, but also a little amused. 

“probably deserve that. couldn’t have been the best way to wake up.”

“Waking up was ...fine.” You say, biting your lip after a moment, your cheeks heating. It had been the leaving him bit that you hadn’t loved. He notices, and closes his eyes, taking a second to collect himself. 

“heh, anyway. working on fixing that situation. i _said_ i was figuring stuff out.” He laughs, and turns back to the machine. “once i figured out that this array up here was basically a big camera designed for filtering out different wavelengths…” He scratches his skull. “when i got up here, it was pointed out, that way.” He gestures at the window, where Mt. Ebott looms on the other side of the bay. 

“I’m really not following, sorry, Sans.” You say, and he shakes his head. 

“i’m not being clear. i _think_ this was set up to trace magic residue from the barrier, to see if any was leaking beyond the barrier. i think they figured that there was a lot going on that human eyes couldn’t pick up on.”

“But now the barrier’s gone, so…” You take a sip, and he nods. 

“i’m thinking… i’m pretty sure that this can show us what background magic would look like converted to light energy. i mean, it exists as light energy on some level already, but i think when i turn on the array and look at this screen back here, i’ll be able to trace…” He squints at the screen, and flicks a switch, and it flickers, shudderingly to life, showing a blue square with the word “unengaged” written in the corner in green. 

“Background magic?” You repeat, then it clicks. “Light energy. Oh. Like… my arm is clearly sticking together with magic, but it’s not always glowing, um… I guess last time it did anything, it was purple?” Sans nods. 

“yeah. and the barrier had magic that wasn’t visible but extended through the whole underground. had to, to stop me from being able to cut a hole out. think your parents had discovered that the barrier had some aftereffects out here too, or at least, they could get a read on it all the way from over here. but…” He takes a gulp of coffee, then says, “uh, basically, i’m gonna point the camera at you, we’re gonna look at the tv, and see if anything interesting shows up.” You can’t help but giggle. “what?” 

“Sorry, it just killed you to dumb it down that much for me, huh?” You laugh, and he rolls his eyes. 

“good scientist is able to explain what they’re working on so a toddler could understand it. i need practice.” He admits. “anyway, let’s get the shades and give it a shot?”

“Sure. It’s, uh, safe, right?” He gives you a smile.

“yeah. just a camera. but i tested it out on me first, anyway.”

“Sans!”

“well, i wasn’t gonna use you as a test!” He says, indignant, pulling a window shade down. 

“Yeah, but… what if you were wrong!?” 

“i wasn’t.” He says with a shrug, and you groan. 

“I don’t like you using yourself as a guinea pig, bonehead. There’s a reason labs follow safety procedures.”

“...yeah, we, uh, we weren’t too big on that down below.” He says vaguely, and you roll your eyes, pulling down another shade. The room is getting dim. 

“What did you see when you tested it?” You finally ask. 

“uh, me. but blue.” He says with a shrug. “then alphys stepped in, and it was, you know, alph, but yellow. which she already is. but yellow halo, i guess.” 

“So, what’s your hypothesis?” You ask, and he grins, pulling the last shade down. 

“you, but… purple, i guess. but i wanna see how your arm reads, if that’s different from the rest of you, because, from what you said, my… y’know, my dad-” He’s looking at that disc of delineation again, the odd, uncomfortable black line that separates flesh and bone. 

“Sans… hey, wait, if we’re doing this, we should, um... talk about that. About Gaster.” You mutter, feeling quite guilty suddenly that you hadn’t found the guts to have this conversation before now. You’d never intended to hide it, but putting it off had sure been easier, somehow. 

“yeah?” He tilts his head to the side, looking both confused and very interested. 

“Okay so… the last time I used my magic more than, like, letting Spot out… if it even is mine, anyway, you know, when Paula… anyway… something weird happened.” 

“oh?” His voice is measured. 

“Yeah. It was like… look, I know I should have told you this sooner-”

“‘s ok. just tell me.” He looks very intrigued. 

“Paula took a swing at Frisk, and I just _snapped._ ” You mutter. “I dunno what I did, but… I am like one hundred percent sure I’m not imagining this. Time… stopped.” You look at him, ready for him to panic, but he merely looks very thoughtful. 

“stopped like…”

“Like, all of a sudden I was in this… dome? I couldn’t see out of it, it was all purple and it was the four of us on the inside, me and Paula and Frisk and Paps. And everyone else was frozen, like pressing pause on a movie.” You say apprehensively. He nods quickly, his eyes wide and interested. “You… okay?” 

“i’m fine.” He assures you swiftly. “knew i saw something.” It’s under his breath, an afterthought. “figured… i dunno. go on.” 

“...Yeah.” You say quietly. “Look, that’s not all, okay, um… I heard that clicking again. Your dad. When I was in the dome.” He inhales sharply at that. 

“you’re sure? i mean, you think it was him?” He says quietly. 

“Yeah. He said something like… ‘I can see what my son sees in you.’” You say softly. “I can’t imagine it would be anyone else. But mostly, he was saying… that I was learning magic fast? And that I had some of yours, I think… and then he sounded kind of pissed off. No. He was _scary._ ” You mutter. “And he said that it looked like I was using his magic too.” You mutter. “I don’t know what it means, really, and I should have told you sooner, I just… I haven’t even, I don’t know if I could do it again, and after everything you went through underground, I, I mean, I don’t want you to think that I planned to mess with time, Sans, I really-”

“babe.” He takes a step closer and hugs you hard. “i’m sorry.”

“What?” You’re lost, confused, braced for him to lash out.

“if i made it seem like i’d be mad at you… i’m not, okay? this stuff is just… it’s just _happening_ to you. all this crazy stuff is just landing on your plate, and you’re coping like a champ. i know you didn’t ask for any of this. i know that.” He says, rubbing your back. He sounds a little unsettled, in spite of those sweet words, but he’s there, he’s with you, and that counts so much more. “then what happened?”

“Um. Gaster… left. I couldn’t feel him there any more. And I just stood there. For a long time, I think.”

“...how long are we talking?” He asks quietly, and you shake your head. 

“I really don’t know. A while. Hours, at the least. Maybe longer. Until I felt like I could handle everything again.” He lets out a sound of slight surprise. “Yeah. And then I just… popped whatever bubble we were in, and time kept moving. And I’ve never felt like I could do that since then.” You admit, taking a step back and meeting his eyes. “Sans, I’m really sorry-”

“it’s okay.” He assures you again. “i’m really glad you told me. everything we learn is useful.” He looks a little wary, to be fair, but he’s still there, not running scared, and that means a lot. 

“You’re not… freaked, that I, I guess… I can do time stuff? I mean, I think I can do time stuff?” You check, and he shakes his head no, then nods a little, reluctantly, then indicates no again. 

“i know you.” He finally says. “i know you’d never do anything… wrong, with it. and, i guess, i was kinda expecting it.” 

“You were?” You say, feeling blindsided. 

“yeah. your cousin… look. it’s not my story. but frisk can do a little more than they’ve let on to either one of us, i think.” He says. You furrow your brow, and he says, “maybe they’ll open up to you. god knows i’ve tried. maybe because it’s you, though… you know, another human?” He says hopefully, then shakes his head. “i can hope. for right now though… let’s run this thing?” He nods at the machine, and you, your head still spinning, nod in agreement. 

“k. can you stand under the, uh, the dome?” He asks, pulling down the final shade and leaving the room much darker than it had been moments ago. You nod, and walk quickly to the spot he’d indicated, looking nervously at the dome hovering above you. “it’s gonna move.” Sans warns, and you nod again. 

The machine boots up in stages, and the blue screen suddenly flickers to life, a black and white shot from above you, like a security camera in a store, coming into focus. Sans looks at it, then pulls a control and the camera arm above you lurches back, the shot shifting until it’s looking down at you at a slight angle. “k.” He mutters. “here goes.” He flips another switch, there’s a soft sound, a rumble, and then the screen snaps into color. 

“woah.”

It’s not color, exactly. The room is still black and white, but there you are, the space around your heart that shifting fire color, slowly fading into purple maybe a few inches away from your soul. But… that’s not all that’s lighting up. There’s another color on the screen, one that Sans needs to change the camera angle to see. Once he gets both of you in the shot, it becomes clear. There’s tendrils of blue magic, _his_ magic, being drawn into your soul even at this distance, feet apart from each other. His magic, bits and pieces, are sliding through the air like tiny ribbons of light being drawn into a black hole, directly into your soul, unable to escape the magnetic pull.

“Oh, god!” You’re horrified. “What the hell am I doing to you, Sans!?”

“uh, nothing.” He sounds bewildered. “feels like nothing. i’m gonna step closer-”

“Don’t! What if I-”

“if you were gonna hurt me, i’d already be hurt.” He reasons. “this has been going on this whole time, remember? we’re just seeing it for the first time now.” He takes a step closer, and more smoky twists of blue magic rush towards you, burrowing into your soul. “huh. how about that.” He mutters, moving his arm experimentally in the air. Looking at him, you see nothing, but on the screen behind him, there’s a trail, an echo, an afterimage of blue magic. It begins to drift away, and then seems to fall into your orbit and is drawn closer, apparent fuel for the furnace that is your soul. 

Oh, god, you’d thought your soul was beautiful, you’d actually thought that, you hadn’t known what you were doing, that you were a leech, a vampire, a thief...

“There’s something wrong with me.” You whisper, feeling disgusted, crossing your arms in front of your chest, trying to block out the image of your soul drawing his magic in. The camera jitters, when you pull your right arm into view.

“no there isn’t.” Sans says, his eyes locked on the screen. “nothing wrong with you.” He steps back to the controls, and zooms the camera in on your arm, looking suddenly worried. You see what he sees a second later. 

The camera hates that black disc, Gaster’s creation. It renders choppy and pixilated and not at all like the smooth circle you see in real life. But from it… again, faint, pitch black tendrils of magic are drawn, woven through the bones of your arm, your hand, like tendons, like your missing musculature… but they don’t stop on the bony side of your arm, no, they lace through you, following the path of the veins in your arm, scraps of black smoke being constantly drawn, faint but steady, into your soul. 

“Turn it off.” You beg. “This is… I don’t want to be like this.” Sans takes a breath, then shakes his head. 

“just a little more. s’okay. you’re okay.” He whispers. “babe, just… try to do magic, okay, just a little? open a door.” He urges, and you grit your teeth and nod. Closing your eyes, refusing to look at the screen, you trace a tiny door to your bedroom, barely the size of your palm. “good.” He whispers. “look. look. you didn’t take anything from me.” He says. “not even making the door. you’re not drawing from me. it looks like human mages just… collect extra magic. that’s all. you’re okay.” 

“Extra?” You crack your eyes open. 

“extra. already used. remember, we monsters work different. we shed magic energy all the time. s’like… body heat.” He tries to explain. “nobody’s stealing from you if they, um, put on a coat that’s already warm cuz’ you wore it, right?” 

“Right.” You say, suddenly seeing what he’s saying. “I’m not… pulling it from you, then? It really isn’t hurting?” 

“right.” He assures you quickly. “i am really sorry for this analogy, babe, but you’re like… you know, a sponge? you draw in, um, residue, it looks like?” 

“A sponge.” You repeat, and he grimaces. 

“again, sorry.”

“No! Thank god! I want to be a sponge! Rather be a sponge than a… damn succubus!” You say instantly, watching your soul swirl on the screen. “But… my arm?” Sans hisses out a breath.

“i dunno. it looks like whatever my old man cast sheds just like a living monster. i just hope…” He blinks. “i dunno. his magic never used to be that color. i wish i had answers.”

“Do I just do it to you? Like, are you the only monster I'm, uh, cleaning up after?” You mutter, watching the blue tendrils on the screen again. 

“doubt it.” Sans says, “not if you’re getting the same effect from dad’s spell too. i bet you pull magic from just about anything that sheds it.”

“Why’s my magic purple, then?” You ask softly, looking at the orange red hue of your soul, and how the color flares into purple like a sunset the further away you look. Sans snorts. 

“preface this with it being a guess.” He cautions. “but i’m thinkin’ it’s because my magic’s blue, and because i’ve been, uh, shedding a hell of a lot of it near you.”

“Heh.” You manage. 

“i’m guessin’ if you got really snuggly with alphys, your magic would start to get more orange.” He mutters, then pauses. “don’t, though.” 

“Wasn’t planning on it.” You assure him. “So my arm…”

“looks like it’s got nothing to do with me. that spell’s holding it together, and it’s like no magic i’ve ever seen.” He breathes. “do you mind standing here just a little longer? there’s just a few more things-”

The door to the lab echoes with a deliberate knock. 

“Is it safe to come in?” Undyne’s wickedly amused voice carries through the door. You glance at Sans, uncertain. “You guys done, uh, playing science?”

“Uh-”

“yup.” Sans calls louder than you. She steps in, her expression of gloating glee turning to confusion when she sees you under the machinery. 

“Oh. You’re actually doing science.” She snorts. “Right.” 

“shh. look at the screen.” Sans says, distracted. “like i thought. sponge.” 

“What?” Undyne steps forward, and the teal scraps of magic the camera reveals she’s leaving in her wake, they slowly slide towards you, into you. “Oh, what?” She repeats, looking at the screen. 

As Sans begins to explain, you look at the screen, watching the color of magic around your body slowly shift, the purple tempering and becoming deeper as more colors of magic mix. 

Okay, you think to yourself, checking once again, just to be certain, that Undyne doesn’t seem to be in any distress. She’s not. She’s looking at you, fascinated. 

“Can all humans do that?”

“pretty sure only a handful. we just happen to know ‘em.” Sans says wryly. 

“COOL.” Undyne cries. “________, use my magic, make a spear!” 

“Uh, I don’t know if I can-”

“DO IT!” Undyne bellows, and you flinch, and try your best, sticking your hand out, and for a second, you almost have it, you almost have something, and then it slips away and Undyne pouts. “Shucks. We’ll just have to snuggle more until you can do it.” 

“nice try.” Sans growls, and Undyne smirks at him.

“She’s my BFF, we can snuggle, BFFs do it all the time!”

“and alphys? she gonna be happy with this snuggling arrangement?” Sans clearly thinks he’s won. 

“She can snuggle with us too!” Undyne crows. “We can get one of those huge beds, and-”

“like hell you will!”

As the very serious scientific discussion turns almost immediately into jealous bickering, you take a step back, and gulp in a breath. 

Sponge. 

Okay. You can live with sponge.


	56. In Which You Get Some Laundry Done

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hah, sorry, I had to stop the chapter here or I'd never get it done.  
> Old skool TST cliffy hangz, kinda.   
> \-----------------------  
> FANART HAS HAPPENED AND IT IS GLORIOUS:
> 
> [LIL BEAN FRISK](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139016962011/submitted-by-donchakno-whoop-here-mom)
> 
> [the sass i get from u kiddos](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/138993495606/submitted-by-theoutworlder-i-cannot-explain-why-i)
> 
> and who could forget: [BONEPAL IS TURNED ON WHEN YOU THROW UP THE HORNS](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139037258756/mod2amaryllis-totalskeletontrash-are-these-the)

“Guys.” Five minutes have passed, and Undyne and Sans show no signs of stopping griping at each other. In fact, both of them look like they’re enjoying it a hell of a lot. 

“We need to see if she can even make a spear in the first place, so she’s gotta hang out just with me. Snuggly style. That’s _science_ , Sans.”

“heh, you think setting something on fire is science too. no wonder you lived in waterfall, you’re a _cavewoman_.”

“You lived in a cave too, idiot, we all did, literally the entire underground was a-”

“GUYS.” You groan, stepping out from beneath the camera dome and standing between them. You have the inexorable mental image of conflicting magics being absorbed into your soul, but now that you’re out of range of the camera, there’s no evidence that you’re - bleaugh, you’re gonna have to find a better term than collecting residue, that sounds disgusting. “This has been a really fun time listening to you, um, call each other weird and mean names? But… are we done? Like, have we reached a conclusion here?”

“oh, uh…” Sans pauses, thinking this over, then switches off the machine, his eyes suddenly alight. “i mean, i guess for the time being?”

“Um, meaning?” You prod, reaching behind him to steal the last gulp of the coffee he’d been kind enough to share with you. 

“welp. doesn’t look like your arm’s gonna fall off anytime soon.” He says with a slow, languid, exciting grin. You think on this for a second and suddenly you grin back at him, gathering the unspoken conclusion from that phrase. Heck yes.

“Okay, so… I know her arm not falling off is a good thing and all, but… you guys look, like… maybe too happy about it?” Undyne says, arching a brow. 

“Um, Undyne, it’s my arm!” You laugh, catching yourself. “Yeah, I’m happy about it.” Well, not just that, but you couldn’t very well say that you were happy that your boyfriend would probably feel the need to tear your clothes off the second she left the room (...for the sake of good science, of course). At least, you couldn’t say that while Sans was anywhere nearby, or he’d be insufferable for the foreseeable future. You were fond of smug Sans, but there were limits even for you. 

“Well, awesome! So, got any more science planned for the rest of the day?” She asks. 

“uh…”

“Nope?” You answer with a shrug, still trying to sound nonchalant. 

“Good, so no plans?”

“ _uh._ ” Sans is a little more pointed, and you dart a glance at him, then at Undyne, then sigh,

“...Nope?” You ignore the slightly defeated groan from next to you, as you say exactly the wrong thing. 

“Perfect!” Undyne beams. “So you can help me get set up for the party!” 

“oh. the party.” Sans says flatly. “‘s gonna be fun.” He’s visibly discouraged. Undyne squints at him, then at you. 

“Oh! I was… thinking that I could research new cars online? For a few hours?” You fumble, trying to recover the situation. Research was something that you could do in your room, right? In private? With your boyfriend?

“Dude, you can teleport.” Undyne points out. “And we live and work in the same place now, if you really needed a ride. You can put it off for a non-party day.” It’s perfectly rational. It’s the sort of thing you can’t really find a good argument against. After all, you had been lying. God, wasn’t there a “get-out-of-decorating-so-you-can-get-banged-real-good” excuse that sounded halfway realistic? You think for a second. 

You’re coming up blank. 

“I… suppose that makes sense.” You say glumly. She squints at you again. 

“Hey, are you okay? If you’re having a bad day or something, you really don’t have to!” She urges, so sincerely that you can tell she wasn’t asking those questions just to mess with you and Sans. No, you think reluctantly, she really and truly just wants to hang out with you. Which means… ugh, you can wait. It’s New Year’s Eve. Maybe it’ll be more fun that way. Maybe, you think, looking at him from the corner of your eyes, he deserves to wait, after that stunt this morning...

“No, no, shh, I’m just sleepy. It’ll be fun, uh, decorating. Get set up, cook some more, make a playlist...” You assure her with a grin. 

“Hey, alright! Make sure you get a nap in or something, though, this is New Year’s Eve, can’t have you crapping out on us halfway through the night!” Undyne urges. 

“nap could be definitely be arranged.” Sans sounds _much_ happier at that suggestion, and you do your best not to look at him, feeling his eyes on you. Goddamn it, Sans, don’t… don’t be so distracting. 

“Aw, sleepyheads had a late date last night?” Undyne coos. 

“Not that late.” You do your best not to grumble, and Sans coughs quietly, hiding a smile behind his hand. Undyne’s eye narrows, looking at the two of you. 

“Huh.” She finally says, sounding unconvinced of, well, everything. “Well, you wanna get started decorating? I ran out last night and got all these streamers and balloons and stuff.” 

“Oh, hey, we’re going all out, huh?” You laugh, and she nods excitedly. 

“It’s our first real New Year’s Eve! Last one, we’d barely been out a month, we didn’t even know about New Year’s.” She explains. “Besides, I think a lot of people are gonna come! All our old friends from the underground were into it, and Frisk’s friends from school, and… it’s gonna be rad!” She pumps her fist, and you grin. “‘Sides. If you have any trouble tonight, there won’t just be a few of us. There’s gonna be a damn army.” She says, suddenly serious, and you hesitate. 

“Tonight? I figured that they were all still pretty beaten down from last time-”

“they probably are.” Sans wraps an arm around your waist and raises a browbone at Undyne. “better safe than sorry, though. they wanna attack on a day that everyone’s supposed to be celebrating again, they’re gonna regret it.” He says, and you nod reluctantly. 

“Well, let’s hope they don’t - shit. Guys. Paula.” You suddenly recall her threat, and feel both of them looking at you. “She said she’d give us until New Year’s. She might mean today.”

“Hah, like she’s gonna show her sorry ass after the last time she showed up here.” Undyne scoffs. “Don’t worry, nerd, we’ll keep her away. G.D. promised to work security at the driveway gate tonight too. Nobody uninvited is getting in.” She promises. 

“Still.” You turn to Sans, who still has his arm around you, and you can’t help but brush your lips against his cheek. “Babe, can you make sure everyone’s on board, that Frisk doesn’t wander too far out of sight for the next few days?” 

“on it.” He agrees, hugging you a little closer, and you smile down at him, kissing him again, finding his lips this time. Maybe you stay there a little long. Undyne clears her throat. 

“Uh, d’you guys need some time?” Sans perks right up. 

“yes.” He gives her a tense grin. 

“Sans!” You try to groan, but really only laugh, trying not to blush. “I’m going to decorate.” You say, wriggling out of his grip. 

“hm, fine. tell me when you need to, uh, nap.” He drawls, and you let out a terribly embarrassing giggle and hurry off before anyone can say anything else that’s ridiculous. Undyne lags behind you, a puzzled look on her face. 

\------------------------------

You don’t get the chance to, uh, nap. You’ve got a thousand things that apparently need getting done before throwing this monster… rager? Party? Heh, “mash?” Undyne tells you that she estimates at least seventy people, but not to worry, hospitality is big with monsters so nobody will be showing up empty handed. 

“And no uninvited guests, right?” You double check, hanging up the last streamer in the foyer - the place looks like a silver ribbon and streamer bomb has exploded - and Undyne laughs and nods. 

“Yeah. No psychos in all black, no… Jerry.” 

“Oh, thank god.” You sigh.

“Figured you wouldn’t want terrorists at this party.” 

“Or Jerry!’ You laugh, and narrow your eyes as a soft ‘heh’ is audible from the next room over. Sans is prowling around, being decidedly unhelpful, and just waiting for you to crack. And, god, you want to, you really do, but your absence would just be _so_ conspicuous, and… 

Ugh, hell, maybe you just didn’t want him (and Undyne) to know just how easy it was to have your entire mind preoccupied with straight up sin, to the point where even the discovery that you were a magic… ugh, sponge, didn’t seem that interesting. 

Finally, after the sun has set and calm has settled over the house, it seems like there’s nothing left to do but wait for your guests to arrive. Well, Undyne’s guests. Well, yours too. You supposed. You have to admit that you’re excited - an actual party! Granted, a party that kids would be at (Frisk was beside themselves with excitement), but still… a party with people that you liked! 

You’re just pacing over to make sure you’ve put ice in the drink bucket when he falls in step next to you, bony fingers sliding around your right wrist, his pinky dragging across the fine bones on the inside as he does so. He’s been missing for the past hour or so, keeping Frisk out of everyone’s hair after a very short _somebody_ had started setting off noisemakers about seven hours early, and you’d relaxed somewhat, dropped your guard to the point where even this tiny contact makes your knees buckle slightly. 

He doesn’t say anything, just grins at you and strolls by your side, guiding you deeper and deeper into the house, your heart thumping pleasantly in your ears. Finally, he seems to think you’ve gone far enough and opens a door at random - it’s the laundry room, pitch black and smelling faintly of fabric softener. It’ll do. He raises an eyebrow at you, an invitation, and you step in at once, tugging him along with you, a huge smile on your face. 

Somewhere else in the house, the sound system kicks on, your playlist beginning to play - fuck, the party must really be starting soon, what time was it? - as he pushes up against you and you lean back against the washing machine, kissing him hard as you slide your arms around his waist.

He wastes very little time, sliding his hand over your hip, up your shirt, dipping into the cup of your bra and grabbing urgently, while you try not to whimper into his mouth. Oh, god, he’s pressing between your legs as he kisses you and he’s hard, even through your jeans that’s obvious, and your brain is moving sluggishly but very, very happily. He pulls away, breathing heavily, his tongue snaking out to trace a line up your neck - it seems particularly inhuman right now, and you’re almost astonished at how much you’re enjoying that fact. But… god, people are going to be here any minute!

“Sans… no time for-” You pant, pressing against him.

“i know.” He purrs, a deep rumble you can feel all through you. As your eyes adjust, you can see a positively wicked look on his face. 

“Then… hnnng-” His teeth are on your neck now, and he’s toying expertly with your nipple, “then why-” He looks up from your neck reluctantly, rocking his hips slightly against yours as he murmurs, 

“just wanna make sure we’re on the same page.” Your eyes widen in horror, then slide shut immediately as he finds a new spot to bite, twisting his hand into your hair. Oh, god, he had every intention of leaving you like this until midnight, didn’t he, a desperate, aching fever in your chest -

The doorbell rings. He licks the spot he’s been biting one last time, then takes a step back. 

“sorry to, uh, _hang you out to dry,_ but it’s time to be a good host.” He says with a wide grin, winks at you, and - oh god, the bastard steps through a doorway that he’s opened and closed before you can even process what’s happened. 

You take a long minute to collect yourself, before practically stomping out of the laundry room, murder on your mind.


	57. In Which Everything Goes According To Plan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MY GOD SO MUCH FANART TODAY WHAT GOT INTO YOU KIDS:
> 
>  
> 
> [sleepy snas and reader got SMUTTY today](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139088149446/artanddetermination-totalskeletontrash)
> 
>  
> 
> [Just a girl and her dog](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139094968271/submitted-by-sparrowcheek-thank-you-for-such-a)
> 
>  
> 
> [ the broadway crossover you never knew you needed ](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139100059126/mod2amaryllis-now-that-ive-placed-a-sorta)

Little shit. Little goddamn shit, oh god. You make it halfway down the hall, before you think about what you probably look like, since the little shit in question had been all over you. You let out a soft whine of distress, hearing the sound of voices in the foyer, the excited chatter of your friends, and new friends, and the… and the goddamn asshole who had just…

Gritting your teeth, you quickly, irritably, slice a doorway to your bedroom, stepping through and sealing it with no small amount of exertion. You have to stop and catch your breath for a second once the door is sealed, glaring at nothing. Well there was another reason to be sulking right now! You were certainly drawing in magic all the time, according to those cameras, but in order for you to do the big stuff, it was beginning to feel like it almost certainly took an _extra_ contribution to make it anywhere near easy. And your willing contributor had just made a goddamn fucking _laundry pun_ , and then - 

Okay. Time to calm down. 

You take a deep breath, picking your way over to the bathroom, and flip the light switch, though not before you notice the trail of faintly glowing saliva on your neck. Your hand balls into a fist and it takes more than a little effort to not think of any more unkind names for Sans. However, the light reveals that your hair is a mess, your neck is possibly messier, your bra needs adjusting, and… oh hell, you need to just try again, if you want any shot of looking presentable. 

Fine. Fine. You’ll try again.

You know you’re being rude, not coming down to greet everyone, but you take your time, washing your face - and neck, jeez-, brushing and styling your hair, reapplying makeup (perhaps a bit bolder than you might usually, just to make a point), and changing from the outfit you’d worn all day while setting up in. Well, the last one was enough to make you glad that he’d pulled that shit, almost; you’d grabbed a shirt at random from your dresser this morning, and it had taken until this very minute to realize that it featured a rasta chili pepper with the words “We Be Jammin’, Mon” on the back. Maybe not the best outfit to wear when meeting new people. Or, well, anyone. 

There had to be a good reason you owned that, right?

You decide not to worry too much about it, and switch into black jeans that are a little tighter than you usually wear, a shirt that hangs off one shoulder, and boots with a heel, just to really drive home to Sans that you’ve got a few inches on him. Okay, you’re being spiteful, but you certainly aren’t alone in that category tonight. And besides, it’s not like you’re dressing _too_ outrageously. You’re just showing him that you won’t be intimidated by rogue acts of…. 

...dry humping. Okay. 

Taking a deep breath, you push open the door and proceed downstairs, greeted by Undyne’s immediate shout of,

“There you are, loser! Look who’s here!” She gestures excitedly, and you grin, recognizing Tommy, the guy from the fish market, and the monster who must be his boyfriend - what was his name? -, a tall, extremely muscular monster that looked halfway between horse and… fish? He seemed to be hovering very slightly, in order to move around on land, his arms wrapped around both Tommy and Undyne’s shoulders. 

There’s a few other monsters chatting with Alphys in the foyer, and already quite a few coats by the door, so you figure that more people and monsters are already inside, milling about - or being dragged about by Papyrus. Sans is nowhere in sight, in spite of his claim that he wanted to be a good host. You try not to let your irritation show on your face, but end up smiling sincerely when Tommy gives you an eager, shy wave. 

“Oh, hey guys! Tommy, I’m really glad you came out! And, hey, nice to meet you-” 

“Aaron.” The monster introduces himself, taking your hand, smiling cheesily, then placing a big, ostentatious kiss on the back of it, winking. You burst out laughing, it’s such an over the top performance. Tommy groans, then does a double-take. 

“Oh… um… ________?” His voice sounds higher pitched than it had been the last time you’d seen him. “Uh, just out of curiosity, has that… always been like that?” He’s staring at the bones in his boyfriend’s hand like he’s never seen anything like it. Aaron turns his big head to stare at Tommy. 

“Is that not normal for humans?” He asks, looking confused. You can’t help but laugh as Tommy  
squints at Aaron. 

“Um, sweetheart, you’ve lived on the surface for a year now, you should know what humans usually look like.” He says pointedly, and Aaron whinnys out a laugh. 

“What do you mean?! You’re all different colors and shapes and your manes-”

“Hair.” Tommy sounds like this is the thousandth time he’s made that correction. 

“Hair has even more colors and shapes. Too bad about your arm though, ______. Can’t get ripped without muscles!” Aaron laughs, releasing your hand to flex slightly. Tommy sighs, then raises an eyebrow at you. You shrug. 

“Wanna grab a drink and I’ll tell you about it?” You offer. 

“Um, yes. Thank you.” Tommy agrees, and Undyne beams, elbowing Aaron. 

“The humans are making friends!” She hisses. 

“I know, isn’t it cute!?” Aaron booms at your retreating backs. You glance behind you to see that he’s now winking at Undyne. 

“Wow, your boyfriend is sure… a winker.” You say, and Tommy snickers. 

“He just gets excited when he’s meeting new people.” He says, and, thinking of Papyrus, you nod,

“Yeah, I’ve got one of those too.” He snickers, and you show him to the TV room, where the drinks are set up, and grab a beer, holding one up questioningly. When he nods, you open it and pass it over, feeling his eyes lingering on your arm. “Okay.” You sigh, collapsing into an ottoman. “...weird story.” You’ve been thinking about this for a while, how to attempt to explain this to other humans, humans who weren’t Frisk at least, in the simplest fashion. Your version of the story gets a little hazy and unspecific; a door in space time opens up in front of you, but you certainly don’t make it yourself, something happens there (you’re not sure what), there’s no mention whatsoever of Gaster, just of you and Ghost and Papyrus and Pizzaface, as you’d unkindly nicknamed your attacker. 

You do your best to tell Tommy all this, figuring that, hey, he’s in the same boat as you, and that he should know that, dating a monster, weirdness was totally on the table. Telling him is challenging, though, not because the story makes you feel particularly emotional right now, but because there’s so many people hurrying in and out, grabbing drinks, stopping for hugs or introductions. About halfway through, Mettaton arrives, and you have to introduce him to Tommy, who’s absolutely starstruck and can barely stammer a word out. Mettaton is cordial and gracious, right up until he sees a feline figure strolling over to the drink table, tail twitching, and then he takes a step back, ducking his head, as you stand up to greet Lawyerpants.

“Hey, buddy!” He exclaims, eyes alight, then grimaces. “Or, uh-”

“Hey, it’s a party. Let’s skip the formality.” You laugh. “Man, _nice suit_.” You’d thought he was impeccable the last time you saw him, but he could have stepped off of a billboard for Armani this time. Granted, it would be a weird, cat-centric billboard, but a billboard all the same. He lets out a purring laugh, then his pupils widen, seeing your arm (this has rapidly become a theme), just as Ghost’s do when the kitty spies something interesting. 

“Hey, bud… sorry about that. Toriel told me, uh, the abbreviated version, the day after Christmas.” He says, and you shrug. 

“I kinda like it. Serves the same function as my last arm.” You admit. “Plus it’s, you know, super punk rock.” He purrs out another laugh at that, and sets to fixing himself a scotch, neat, then pats your shoulder. 

“Hey, I gotta circulate. Find my, uh… friend.” He says. “See you around, okay?” He pats your shoulder, tips a wave to Tommy (who hasn’t talked, looking totally overwhelmed at this point), and pointedly ignores Mettaton. 

“Sorry, beauties, my deepest apologies, but I simply must circulate as well.” Mettaton says, giving you both a wide, false smile, and drifts off in the same direction that Lawyerpants had disappeared before you can warn him about what happens when you bother a cat for too long. Tommy sighs. 

“Did you seriously make friends with every single hot monster all at once?” He says mournfully, hopping up to get another beer. 

“nah. met me first.” Sans’ voice cracks, amused, from the direction of the other hallway. You pause, and take a pointed second to turn around, giving him your best expression of mild interest, like nobody particularly important had said anything, and then sink back into your armchair, taking a sip of beer. 

“Hm.” You say, trying to look uninterested, though the hairs on the back of your neck stand up when he strolls over to you and perches on the arm of the chair, just close enough to barely be touching you. He’s got a cider it looks like he’s been working on for a while, and an evil grin on his face. Tommy observes this, trying to hide a smile. When nobody says anything, you finally sigh. “Tommy, my boyfriend Sans. Sans, Tommy is dating Aaron.” Sans snorts and extends a hand to shake - you whip your head to make sure he’s not doing a buzzer trick - or worse, Frisk had told you that he had a whoopie cushion one too, which suddenly makes you burst out laughing, unable to help it. 

Sans pauses, mid-shake, and turns to look skeptically at you. 

“somethin’ funny?” 

“Oh, god, I’m so sorry guys, I just remembered… Frisk and I hid all those whoopie cushions yesterday, and I don’t think Papyrus set them all off…” You say, too amused by the prospect of innocent guests deploying them to be irritated about the fact that Sans had left you all hot and bothered. For now. Sans mulls this over for a second, then snickers, finishing the hand shake while Tommy looks like he’s never witnessed anything like the two of you. 

“heh. that’s gonna be great.” Sans laughs, leaning against you slightly. “hey, kid, don’t warn aaron. it’ll make my night if he sits on one.” 

“You know Aaron?” Tommy finally laughs. Sans shrugs. 

“i know everyone.” He says with a placid grin. “speakin’ of which, babe, l.d. wants you to meet his family.” 

“Oh? Where is he?” You say, sounding a little suspicious. 

“kitchen.” Sans is all sweet innocence. 

“Go on, I should find Aaron anyway, before he starts trying to lift anyone.” Tommy laughs, standing up. 

“later.” Sans tips a wave and a wink that seems just a little like he’s imitating Aaron. Tommy nearly coughs on his beer, and, when he’s behind Sans’ back and you’re waving at him, offers you a mouthed ‘nice!’ with two thumbs up, jerking his head at Sans. You hear yourself giggle, then groan when Sans looks innocently up at you. For the moment, it’s just the two of you in earshot (there’s a few monsters you’ve been introduced to and promptly forgotten the names of by the Christmas tree, but that doesn’t count). “what’s wrong, babe?” He’s grinning, and you bump him hard enough with your shoulder that he nearly loses his balance on the armrest. He smirks at you and says, “looks like something’s got you all wound up.”

“I’m very mad at you.” You do your best to sound very mad, standing up, but it clearly doesn’t work, because he just hops up right after you and slides his arm around your waist. 

“shame.” He says lightly. 

“Not the one who should be talking about shame right now.” You drawl, ignoring how happy you are to have him this close again. 

“hm, you changed.” He switches subjects rapidly, and it takes you a second to catch up as to what he’s talking about. “feelin’ a little _unclean_? your, uh, clothes, i mean.” He’s walking you ostensibly towards the kitchen, and you’re doing your best to remember that’s the end goal. 

“I don’t know why you’re so pleased with yourself.” You snort. “You’re in the same boat as me, pal. Oh, wait, I know, maybe it’s ‘cause you’re used to it, since you’ve got literally a permanent case of blue ba-”

“frisk! hi frisk!” Sans says urgently, as you turn the corner in the hallway and nearly run into your cousin, who’s leading a pack of small monsters through the house, their expression gleeful. 

“ **There she is! That’s my cousin!** ” Frisk bellows, and seven or eight monster kids surge forward, starry eyed, trying to get a good look of your arm, while you do your best to collect yourself. 

“woah, easy guys.” Sans is suddenly all sweet and protective, like he hadn’t been tormenting you just a second ago, which is enough to make you thaw a little. 

“Yo, can we see it?” One of the kids - who you recognize from the palace, the kid with no arms - chirps, and you chuckle, holding your arm out so the little monsters can admire. 

“COOL.” Four or five voices say in unison as the kids lean forward to look, admiring, and you grin, happy that Frisk’s friends are so impressed. Sans clears his throat after a second, and you laugh at him. 

“Sorry guys, I guess Sans wants me to meet some dogs?” You laugh (suspecting that it’s not even a little on his mind right now). Sans shrugs, Frisk scoffs, and then points the kids onwards, muttering something about gross adults smooching. Sans watches them leave, then looks back at you. 

“you were saying?” He says lightly, eyes sparking, and you groan and take a step closer to him, leaning to whisper in his ear (...er, area), 

“Blue. Balls. You sure you want to be so accustomed to them, bonehead?” You kiss his temple, as softly as you can manage, then, when he doesn’t protest or move, drop a little further down to the hinge of his jaw, brushing your lips against it. He makes a soft noise that is in no way a complaint, and you grin to yourself, thinking that this is much more fun. You’ve worked your way down to a vertebrae (and his hand has worked from your waist to the fabric of your waistband just below your lower back), and you’re vaguely thinking that this isn’t a good spot, that this is a hall and anyone could walk by, when someone walks by. 

“Yo, boss!” Undyne calls, and you jump from Sans like a startled rabbit, whirling around. She locks eyes(/eye) with first Sans, then you, then sighs. “ _The hallway???_ ” She grumbles. “Guys. Guys. We’re making an impression here. They’re going to think we’re a household of horny degenerates, and even though that might be true for half of us, that won’t stand. Not in my house.” Your jaw pops open, ready to protest, when you remember that, yes, this is Undyne’s house, you’d told her that, and you slump, defeated. Sans looks both flustered and guilty (asshole, why hadn’t he looked guilty for you?), but he mutters, 

“uh, maybe you got a point. ‘sup?” Undyne gives you both a very stern look for a moment, not answering, and you sigh. 

“Remember when all you wanted to do was see us kiss?” You whine. “What happened to those days? I miss those days!”

“Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’m all for it, but there’s kids!” Undyne finally cackles, shaking her head at the both of you. 

“they went that way!” Sans protests, pointing vaguely. 

“And kids never turn around and go any other direction, right. I forgot. That’s a rule.” Undyne drawls, and you sigh. 

“Kay, ‘kay, point made. What’s up?” 

“Right.” She snorts. “You know that uninvited guest policy?” 

“That we’re not going to have any?” You drawl. 

“Well, we got one anyway. He slipped by G.D.”

“Aw... dude.” You groan, as Sans snaps,

“what?!” He’s back at your side in a second, looking furious and protective and all sorts of other things that sort of just make you want to push him back against the dark wood and plaster of the wall and pick right back up where you’ve left off. 

“Are they dangerous?” You demand. 

“did you dunk ‘em?” Sans needs to know. 

“Relax.” Undyne sighs. “We got him the second he walked in the door. I just wanna know what you want to do with him. _______, can you please stop looking at Sans like that and focus!? UGH! NERDS. We’ve got him in the foyer.” 

“c’mon. lessgo see.” Sans says, twining his fingers through yours, and he begins walking purposefully towards the foyer, while Undyne scoffs and picks up the rear. 

\-------------------------------------

“Aw. Aw. Undyne.” You see your uninvited guest, and turn to Undyne, who has the good grace to look a little guilty about the smile she’s biting back. 

“He’s not invited.” She points out. 

“ugh.” Sans groans. “really? we’re really doin’ this?” 

In the foyer, Papyrus is sitting on your captive, looking rather unhappy about the fact that he’s the one who has to physically restrain him. Also, well…

Jerry’s a weird shape to sit on. 

“I didn’t even want to come to this stupid party anyway!” He’s complaining. Sans groans, and Undyne tries, again, not to laugh. 

“goddamn it, jerry. how’d you even get in?” Sans demands, keeping his distance. Jerry licks his lips. He takes a long time to do so, and you shudder again. 

“Threw the dog some cheez puffs.” He finally admits. “Walked in while he was distracted. Don’t know why. This place sucks.”

“The one weakness in our security system.” You sigh, and Sans lets out a snort of laughter before catching himself. Jerry sniffles, then lets out a somehow… damp sounding sigh. He looks absolutely miserable. Papyrus pats his head gingerly with one hand, then almost immediately jerks the hand away. 

“Don’t even like parties with cool monsters anyway.” Jerry grumbles, pressing his face closer to the hardwood. 

“Ugh.” Something guilty twists inside of you, seeing how pathetic he looks. “UGH. Okay. Jerry-”

“oh, no, don’t.” Sans mutters. 

“Do you want to stay until midnight?” You finally sigh. Everyone else in the room sags, totally discouraged by this.

“Ugh. Whatever.” He blinks watery eyes, and Undyne groans. 

“And you promise to leave right after the ball drops?” You prompt. 

“I suppose.” He grumbles. You glance at Papyrus, and say, 

“Paps, I’m so sorry. You wanna… just, you know, keep an eye on him? Guard style?” You propose. Papyrus blinks, then says, very gravely, 

“I AM HONORED THAT YOU WOULD TRUST ME TO GUARD SUCH A LOATHSOME … I MEAN, SURE.” He stands up, and Jerry decompresses slightly. Sans and Undyne are both giving you looks. 

“Hey.” You sigh. “He was smart enough to get in here. That taught us a lesson on where our security sucks, right? That’s worth a few beers and snacks. Besides, nobody should have to be alone on a holiday, and he must have been really lonely.” 

“I can hear you, you know.” 

“SHUT THE FLIP UP, JERRY!” Undyne bellows, whipping her head around to look at him, then she sighs. “Yeah. I guess.” 

“you’re too nice.” Sans sighs, but he says it warmly. “c’mon, let’s go see where everyone is. be social. probably smarter than being elsewhere right now.” He says, and you see his point. Both of you clearly can’t be trusted right now. Undyne rolls her eyes at both of you, then points towards the TV room. 

“Only got two hours left, people are starting to head for the TV.” Undyne says. “I think Aaron just got Woshua to stop cleaning it, even.” 

“oh hell.” Sans laughs, and points two fingers at his eyes, then at Jerry, the universal signal for “I’m watching you,” before he leads the way back deeper into the house. 

\------------------------

The time flies; the TV room is packed. Somehow you missed Asgore showing up, so you have to run over to hug him, and smile at the way that Toriel is right by his side. That’s a good sign, right, if that’s what Toriel wants? Asgore certainly seems like he’s in a good mood. 

Frisk is on Mettaton’s lap; the robot’s finally been coaxed away from following Lawyerpants like a sad puppy, in order to tell stories to a totally adoring audience of children. Speaking of sad puppies, a whole mess of dogs, L.D. amongst them, are gathered around a monster that looks like… a whole mess of dogs. It’s honestly a little unsettling at first, but when L.D. urges you over to meet Endogeny, you lose your nerves; they’re a perfectly sweet dog. Dogs. 

Lawyerpants, on the other hand, looks like he’s chatting up a pretty human girl you’ve never met before, his tail occasionally thrashing when he laughs. Good for him, you think, waving at the cat, then chatting with Tommy and Aaron again, meeting and immediately being scolded by Woshua for your poor housekeeping, dropping to a crouch so you can hear what a Froggit is saying, grabbing another drink, a snack… 

The whole time, Sans is right by your side. 

Finally the big moment rolls around. Everyone’s packed into the room now, eyes locked on the TV, as the countdown begins at a minute. The human hosts on the TV are remarking at what a fascinating year it’s been, how this’ll be one for the history books, as the ball slides lower. Sans squeezes your hand.

“we’re getting outta here the second we can, right?” He murmurs in your ear, and you flush again - you’d been doing such a good job of not doing that! - and nod mutely. He grins, and swings your hand slightly as the seconds crawl down. Everyone begins chanting at ten… nine… eight…

Frisk is tearing around the room, trying to distribute the noisemakers they’d been banned from at the last second.

Seven… six… five…

Undyne is on Alphys’ lap, sharing a single sofa cushion so as not to disturb the little Whimsun sitting shyly next to them. They’re gazing into each other’s eyes, ignoring the countdown, or indeed, the room around them. 

Four… three… two…

The king and queen are practically touching now. Papyrus, remembering the tradition to kiss at midnight, is scrambling desperately away from Jerry. 

One. 

You realize, when the room erupts in a cheer, that you’ve been braced for something terrible to happen, bombs to go off, gunmen to flood in, something! Your head whirls, eyes scanning the room, ready for the attack (Sans is tense next to you, too, and you suspect he’s thinking the same thing), but… nothing happens. In spite of the apparent dramatic predilections of your attackers, they’ve seemed to sit this one out. Instead, all you see are happy couples; Undyne and Alphys, Aaron and Tommy, Papyrus and … well, nobody, but he certainly looked happy. Mettaton scoops Frisk up to give them an ostentatious smooch on the cheek, while Frisk giggles widely, and oh! Toriel and Asgore are kissing very shyly and - 

Sans clears his throat, and you let out a wild, relieved laugh and lean to kiss him too, and after that, it’s like there’s nobody else in the room, even with the noisemakers and laughs and sounds of good cheer, someone turning the TV off and switching the music back on, Jerry whining as Papyrus begins dragging him back outside…

Doesn’t matter. 

When you part, a second later, you’re both a little dazed looking. 

“love you.” He murmurs. 

“Me too.” You say, and he tucks a piece of hair behind your ear. 

“still gonna kick my ass?”

“Yup.” 

“good.” He grins hugely. “upstairs?”

“Please.” 

In the midst of all the good cheer, nobody notices the two of you slip away.


	58. In Which Nobody Gets What They Want

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HEY KIDDOS JUST AS A WARNING:  
> I GO ON HIATUS FOR A WEEK AND A HALF STARTING ON MONDAY, OKAY? 2/15 to 2/25, no updates, because I have big time exams!
> 
> I will probably still be reachable by tumblr though because I'm garbage.
> 
> Have some sin:  
> But first, fanart that I forgot yesterday
> 
>  
> 
> [shame on meeeee](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139072857751/submitted-by-plplkpok-hello-your-fic-are-one-of)
> 
>  
> 
> [I can't believe I forgot to hook you guys up with Lawyerpants](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139073519056/lawyerpants-please-draw-him)
> 
>  
> 
> Oh for shame.

Oh, please. Like you were going to let him get away with his stunt so easily. It was good that he thought he was getting his way, though. That made you feel almost better about the whole thing. 

He looks so pleased with himself as you navigate past the different monsters that have spilled back out into the halls and other rooms, the few humans (should you have made an effort to meet more of them?), the… Jerry, who’s pitching a fit arguing with Papyrus in the foyer. 

“You’re not my boss!” He’s complaining, clinging to the front doorframe while Paps tries to push him outside.

“I AM SO!” Papyrus shrieks, feet skidding on the hardwood; gosh, Jerry is strong, for such a weird little dude. Either that or Papyrus wasn’t giving his all. Sans blinks, then stops to watch the scene, absently running his fingers along the inside of your radius as he does so. Heh. That was new. You… oh, you like that.

“need help, bro?” Sans calls. “looks like you’re in a, uh, _sticky_ situation.” 

“WHY IS HE STICKY!?” Papyrus wails. “JERRY, YOU HAVE NO REASON TO BE SO STICKY!” Jerry blinks those tiny, watery eyes, and lets out a smug laugh. “DON’T BE PROUD OF BEING STICKY!” Papyrus commands, giving him another shove, and Jerry finally topples outside, Papyrus clattering after him. 

“Paps, you okay?” You call, trying not to shiver from the cold, or from Sans’ fingers exploring up your arm. 

“NYEH!’ He sounds fine. “DON’T WORRY, HUMAN, I’LL DO MY BEST GUARDING. I’LL BRING YOU A FULL REPORT AS SOON AS I’M DONE!”

“bro, don’t.” For the first time, Sans sounds a little worried. You smirk at him. 

“BUT I AM ON GUARD DUTY! I MUST REPORT TO MY SUPERIOR OFFICER, AND SINCE _________ GAVE ME MY ORDERS, IT’S HER! NYE- ARGH! GET BACK HERE, JERRY!” Jerry’s making a break to get back inside the house. 

Grillby arrives, neatly stepping over the pile of squabbling monsters in the doorframe, and tilts his head slightly at you and Sans. Oh, god, were people still just showing up?

“heh. hey grillbz.” Sans squirms slightly. He knows, you figure, that he should be a better host to his friends, but he also clearly doesn’t have the patience for that right now. Grillby looks back at the fighting monsters in the doorway, then makes a soft sound, like raindrops hitting a campfire. Well, you’d figured out that there were limits to what you could translate the day that you determined you couldn’t understand L.D., but it still surprised you slightly. Sans shrugs. “found his way in. she’s too nice.” He jerks his head at you. “let ‘im stay.” 

Grillby makes a hissing sound that manages to convey polite incredulity, and you grin guiltily. 

“Hey, Grillby. Glad you could make it.” You say, a little shyly. “And… yeah, I mean, it’s a night for everyone to celebrate. Even Jerry.” Grillby makes a small gesture, but you gather the meaning: _Touche._

“bar closed tonight, grillbz?” Sans sounds a little impatient with small talk. Grillby burns a little brighter, and Sans winces. “oh. uh. yeah. i guess they are all here.” He says, and then plasters on a smile. “well, have fun, bud. saw your daughter around here somewhere, think they were chatting with doggo-”

Grillby stands straight up, then tips a curt wave, and stalks deeper into the house. You arch an eyebrow at Sans, and he laughs quietly. “i mean, i did. wasn’t a lie. but…”

“Mhm.” You drawl, and call to Papyrus, “Hey, give, uh, Asgore your report instead!”

Sans lets out a quiet, but thoroughly evil laugh, and you catch yourself. “Just kidding. Not Asgore. OR Undyne or Alphys or Toriel!”

“THEN WHO DO I TELL?”

“Uh….”

“frisk?” Sans suggests. 

“Frisk needs their sleep!” You lecture, and he snickers. 

“think of someone else, then.” He says under his breath. 

“Uh…. Ghost! Report to Ghost!” 

“OK!” Papyrus yells, then adds, “JERRY, DON’T LICK ME! AGH!!!!”

You shudder, and Sans groans, then tugs you upstairs. 

When he pushes open the door to your bedroom, you step in, and smirk when the very first thing he does is grimace and shove the armoire in front of the door - at least he bothers to use his hands, this time. You were kinda wondering about the last time. 

“Sans, how did you move that thing before? I don’t think I can move stuff without touching it.” Sans smirks at you. 

“sure. ‘s a blue magic thing.” He says, then grins, wide and dangerous. “you’ve got purple magic. right now anyway. i mean, i assume. s’gonna be purple tomorrow.” Oh, that cocky little shit. “hey, hey, babe… wanna see another _blue magic thing_?” He thinks he’s hilarious. You arch an eyebrow at him. 

“Really?” You say, strolling over to the bed and easing your boots off, taking your time with each zipper. “Not on your A game, Sans.” 

“c’mon, that was funny.” He says, and you shrug, pulling off your socks and padding barefoot to the closet, bending down to store your boots. Hey, it’s not your fault if he decides to stare at your butt while you’re doing that, right? You can feel his gaze on you without needing to look. Good. Lazily, you shrug off your shirt. “hey.” You’ve got his attention in full now. “i wanted to do that.”

“Hm. Too bad.” You say, yawning theatrically, and still refuse to turn around. 

“you’re not gonna give me the _cold shoulder_ all night, are ya?” He snickers, but he sounds a little nervous. 

“They’re not cold.” You say, unruffled, shimmying out of your pants now. “Be warmer once I’m snuggled up under my blankets, fast asleep.” He makes a quiet noise of protest. “Mhm.” You sigh, bending over again to pick your pants up and fold them neatly. “See, I was really psyched earlier today about finally getting to… god, is ‘bone’ too played out? I don’t care.” You answer, before he can say something clever. “Like I was saying.” You hang up your pants and finally turn to face him, brushing your hair out of your eyes. “I was very excited about getting to bone my boyfriend, but then he decided to be a tremendous goddamn asshole, and now… hm, I just don’t think I’m feeling it.” You drawl, letting the true frustration you’d felt a few hours ago color your words. 

He stares at you, looking like the dictionary entry for the word “crestfallen.” It’s nearly enough to make you giggle, but you keep your face impassive. “In conclusion, I’m going to bed now.” You saunter back over to the bed, climb in between the covers, and then lean to turn off the lamp, plunging the room into relative darkness. He hasn’t moved. 

“you’re gonna sleep in _that?_ ”

“Got a problem?” You murmur, yawning.

“...no.” He hesitates, then finally, reluctantly, he trudges over, shrugging out of his blue zip-up and leaving it somewhere on the floor, then climbing onto the other side of the bed. Good. Goooood. 

“Night, Sans.” You say cheerfully, stretching out on your back. 

“night, babe.” He does his very best to sound sweet in spite of his obviously crippling disappointment, which is almost, almost enough to make you crack. You dart a glance at him when you think he’s not looking - well, he is looking, but it’s at your breasts (which you’ve left deliberately unobscured by the blanket), rather than your face.

Perfect. 

He can’t miss it, then, when you begin to snake your hand - your right one - very deliberately over your torso, then down, between your legs. You don’t know where you’ve suddenly gotten the guts to tease him like this, but right now, you can’t imagine anything more fun in your entire life. He takes in a slow breath through his teeth, noticing you; he can’t see your hand beneath the blankets, but it seems like his imagination is definitely filling in the blanks. 

“babe.” He says, inching a little closer, and you turn your head and give him a very unimpressed look. 

“Kinda busy here.” You inform him, sliding your hand into your underwear - oh, that felt very unfamiliar, there were way too many bones involved suddenly. Are you really going to do this? 

He looks like a frustrated, miserable mess all of a sudden, and you have to battle mightily to keep the smirk off your face. It lends you enough courage to actually proceed; you rub yourself with a bony finger and let out an involuntary, surprised whimper of pleasure almost immediately; you hadn’t realized how _good_ this would feel. 

“...babe?” He tries again, his cheeks glowing a furious blue. “why don’t i… i mean, i could…” He trails off when you close your eyes, trying to look focused.

“You had your chance earlier, and instead, you decided to mmm-fuck with me.” You’re probably overacting a little.

“sorry.” He says it under his breath, like it hurts to form the syllables. 

“Hm?” 

“i’m sorry. can i help?” He speaks more clearly, and you open your eyes slowly. For a second, the two of you lock eyes, and you raise your eyebrow again, very pointedly, until he groans - that is a lovely sound right now - and then sighs,

“fuck. damn you.”

You wait. He grits his teeth. He knows what you want. 

“ ...please?”

You can’t help it. You let out a loud, victorious laugh, and relent, leaning to kiss him as he sighs with relief and then moves instantly closer, his arms wrapping greedily around you as he runs his hands over what feels like every square inch of body he can at once. One hand chases yours out of your panties, stealing its position, and soon you’re actually whimpering in earnest, sure this is what heaven feels like. This, or something close, anyway. He keeps this up until you’re barely able to catch your breath, his tongue pressing sinuously against yours in a way that human tongues just can’t do. 

Every single part of you is alive, right now, just being this close to him. You think about what he’d said, about shedding magic, and think about how much your soul must be drawing in, just being this close, and then he pulls his hand away from you and all you can think of is how much you wish it was still there. He grins at you, and licks his fingers lewdly, a devilish spark in his eye. 

“Oh, god.” You hear yourself sigh, lifting his shirt off. He assists you without complaint, then eyes your bra. 

“you’re such a tease, fuck.” He sighs, reaching around your back (half lifting you up, with obvious ease) to find the clasp. Which, of course, you’d prepared for - if he was going to fuck with you, you’d thought earlier, you were going to do the same right back, so you’d put on your one front clasping bra, certain that it would throw him for a loop. While he fumbles at your back, you shrug mentally and slide your hand into his shorts, wrapping bony fingers tight around him. “ah-” He grunts, and then there’s a tearing sound and your bra is off - though not by the conventional method. 

“Sans! I liked that one! You didn’t have to-”

“get you another.” He promises hoarsely, and bites your breast just hard enough to almost make you forget to stroke him for another moment or two. 

The two of you keep this up only for a few more minutes, before you both seem to reach an unspoken conclusion. He helps you out of your underwear - much more gently than the scrap fabric that had once been your bra - and kneels between your legs, and you don’t even care that his shorts are still on, just pushed down, you don’t care about anything but-

“please?” This time, the word carries absolutely no reluctance. He always, always wants to make sure you’re on the same page, and you love him for it. 

“Please. I need you. Right now.” You confirm, pressing your hips to him, and you shudder with instant relief when he begins pushing into you - he seems just as relieved. 

“fuck, i love you.” He whispers, feeling your legs wrap around his waist, pulling him deeper - oh god, was he _bigger_? You weren’t sure if you could handle it for a moment, then suddenly, you’re absolutely sure that the only thing you can’t handle is the thought of him, not inside you, ever, ever again. 

“Hard.” You whisper, already clinging to his ribcage, and his eye sparks dangerously. 

He’s more than happy to oblige.

It barely takes five minute before your body totally succumbs, and you moan out his name, trying to hold on as you clutch him again and again, your mind grinding to a blissful halt. He slows down a little, letting you catch your breath, and stops kissing your jaw long enough to meet your eyes, when they slide back open. 

“one.” He counts, the smile on his face either infuriating or amazing - you can’t quite decide - before he begins work on ‘two.’

\----------------------------------

The trouble with skeletons, you mull, several hours later… well, it wasn’t really trouble at all, it was just a fact. Human guys stopped after they came. That was biology, right, they needed a while to collect themselves before they were interested again. 

Sans isn’t constrained by biology in the same way, and he’d clearly spent the last few days thinking about everything he wanted to do to make up for lost time. And, oh god, you had certainly encouraged that pursuit. 

And now… well, you’d never felt more exhausted. Or sticky. 

Or satisfied.

“we should take a shower.” Sans is mumbling against your neck, curled up against you - he really does love being the big spoon. 

“Mmm.” 

“any second now, we’re gonna move and take a shower.” 

“Mhm.” You yawn, your eyelids drooping. 

“it’s gonna happen.” He warns sleepily. 

“Mhm.” You breathe into your pillow, stretching leaden limbs for a second and then wriggling back next to him. 

“tomorrow morning?” 

“Mhm.” He lets out a soft laugh at that. 

“you just saying mhm to everything?”

“Nnn.” He laughs again, and hugs you a little closer.

“okay. night, baby.” 

“S’morning. Technically.” You breathe, tracing your toe along his shin. 

“k. good morning. i love you.” He whispers, so sweetly that it almost makes your heart skip. 

“Love you too. Love you so much.” You mumble. 

“still mad at me?” He’s trying to keep the laugh out of his voice, but you hear it anyway, and love him more for it. 

“Oh, you could do that again sometime.” You say, closing your eyes, and he lets out another sleepy laugh. 

\----------------------------  
He still doesn’t fall asleep for a while. He stays up, his eyes half open, watching the wild, flaring flames of your soul. 

There were billions of other humans on this earth, literal billions. There were thousands and thousands of monsters, too. But _he_ was the one who could make your soul light up like that. You’d picked him, and he got to watch you come alive. 

And for a while, while he’s watching you take deep, even breaths, he doesn’t care about the resets, the eternity spent underground, any of the things that normally made it such a challenge to slap that smile on his face. It had led to you. It had all led to you, every decision, every choice. Some greater force had judged him, and found him decent enough, for you to allow him into your life. 

He’s getting a little emotional, he thinks, pressing closer against your back. But he’s got you. He’s got you. 

He’s never letting go.


	59. In Which There Is A Pleasant Family Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY!   
> I HAVE BEEN STUDYING A LOT BUT HERE IS A CHAPTER!  
> I WILL SEE YOU KIDS BACK HERE NOT THIS WEDNESDAY BUT RATHER NEXT WEDNESDAY. 
> 
> I WILL BE DICKING AROUND ON TUMBLR FOR THAT DURATION I'M SURE BUT ALSO PROBABLY LESS RESPONSIVE THAN THE USUAL.
> 
> OKAY BYE I LOVE YOU.

He wakes up. 

He takes a breath. 

He screams.

He cuts himself off almost immediately, but it’s only because screaming isn’t enough. He’s in a bed, but... He’s not in your bedroom. He’s not in your house. 

He knows this place. 

Row upon row of hospital beds, the miasma of sickness, of despair in the air. The blue green glow from weak fluorescent lights. The pink bedspread. The dead plants. The dog dish. 

“no, no, no … fuck no!” He scrambles upright, out of bed, scrapes desperately at the fabric of space, knowing it’ll be futile, knowing that nothing will open - a reset, a fucking reset, he thought these were done, he thought he was free and now he’s back, down here, in the underground, in the lab, back behind the barrier, back where the sun refused to shine -

The door opens. Just like that. The door opens, and there’s your front yard - he hadn’t known where to try for, he’d just aimed for *home* - and the panic welling up in his throat suddenly recedes. He’s not trapped. He’s not trapped. 

(Well. Now that we have _that_ out of the way.)

He whirls, but the voice comes from nowhere. It’s so familiar, a voice he’d know anywhere, but there’s something different. Underneath the calm, even timbre, there’s a strange, even… clicking. 

“...dad?” He finally rasps.

(Why so surprised?) Click. Click. Click. 

Gaster sounds amused. Sans gathers himself back together by degrees. He hates that he’s been caught off guard, he hates that Gaster knows it… oh, god, does he hate that Gaster knows it, that he’s clearly planned this. Finally, he slaps a smile on his face.

“uh, kinda hard to talk to ya if i don’t know where i’m looking.” 

The voice lets out a bitter, long suffering sigh. (Really, son. I’d have thought you would be miles beyond physical… Very well. But, do know, this is… **uncomfortable** for me.) There’s a moment where nothing happens, and then slowly the shadows in the room begin to creep together, pooling into a shape on the floor, a puddle that slowly rises into a shape that almost, if Sans squints, resembles his father. (There. Satisfied?) The shadow asks, gliding a little closer to Sans. 

Don’t flinch, don’t flinch, don’t….

“heh. not exactly.” He arches a brow. “...where have you been, dad?”

(Busy.) The word is short, clipped. 

“i didn’t ask what you were doing. i asked where you’ve been.” He says, more confidently than he feels. The Gaster-shape straightens slightly, becomes more corporeal.

(Wherever you scraped together the impression that you could address me in that tone-)

“can it.” Sans suggests. “you’ve been gone a long time, gaster. shit, uh, changes.” 

There’s a deadly pause, and then a burst of wild, clicking laughter fills the room. It is not, Sans notes, the sanest laugh he’s ever heard. 

(I have, son. I have been gone a long. A long time.) Gaster whispers. (Do you know where I’ve been yet?) Click. Click. Click, his father’s voice goes. 

Sans recognizes that clicking suddenly. His gaze darts to the wall of the lab, and Gaster chuckles, this time sounding proud. 

(Good lad. That’s right. When I opened that door, that power, I couldn’t have known… no. I had hopes. I had hopes. The void was too small. There was no way out from there. I had to go deeper. Or… advance.)

“how did you-”

(Picture a two dimensional line. A two dimensional world. Picture a square. The square exists on that two dimensional plane. It is flat.) Gaster clicks, that familiar, didactic tone in his voice, a professor to a student. (How could a square conceive of a cube? You can, of course, son, but the square, even if it was intelligent enough to do so, could not. You can imagine a depth, not just a length and width. You exist in a three dimensional world.) He clicks out a rhythmic laugh. (I knew I was close when I reached the limits of my perception, my comprehension, when I struck something I could only understand as **darkness**.) 

Sans doesn’t look at the shadowy shape of his father. He’s still looking at the wall. Well, he’s looking at the wall clock. More specifically, he’s looking at the second hand. 

Click. It advances a fraction, one sixtieth of a circle. Click. Click. Click. Click. 

He looks back at his father, and a scrap of advice someone had told him long ago drifts through his skull. 

_Beware the man who speaks in hands. ___

__“so you made it, huh? the fourth dimension. huh. really is time. just like we thought.” He finally says, low and even._ _

__(I did. It took me some time to adapt, to understand that my three dimensional self simply would not do. Luckily, where I am now… I have nothing but.) Another clicking laugh. (I imagine I would look quite monstrous to you now, if you could perceive me. Probably for the best that you don’t try.)_ _

__Sans takes a while to think this over. He wishes desperately that he was wearing something more than novelty boxers at the moment._ _

__“why didn’t you free us, gaster?” He finally whispers. “if you found a way past that damn barrier, why didn’t you-”_ _

__(That’s why I brought you here.) Gaster suddenly has no more self satisfaction in his voice. He is stern, almost furious. (We need to have a little father-son chat about who you’ve chosen to … consort with.)_ _

__“wh-”_ _

__(QUESTIONS LATER.) Gaster suddenly booms. (Do you really think I was free, you imbecile? Do you really think I could have freed you pissants? THE BARRIER WAS COMPLETE. Do you understand me? NOTHING COULD GET OUT. **NOT. EVEN. TIME.** ”) He stops for a second, seeming to gather himself. (I am… constantly surprised and astonished by how facile the human souls have proved when it comes to time magic.) He finally whispers. (It seems to be a bit of a speciality in their species. But then, you’re a smart lad. You know.)_ _

__“thought i was an imbecile-”_ _

__(Son. Son. Please.) Gaster lets out another suffering sigh. (Such a persecution complex. May we continue?) He actually waits, the shadowy shape doing its best to look patient somehow, until Sans slowly inclines his head. (The barrier made it easier, of course. Limited the possibilities, limited the effort. So easy, even a child could do it. Several children, in fact, as I believe you’ve gathered. Oh, the skips, the resets, the loading and reloading from set points! Just children, Sans. Children shaking a snowglobe and seeing where the flakes fall. Until finally, your little pet human shook that snowglobe so hard it broke open, and then your world opened and….) He breathes in a hiss of satisfaction, (so did mine.)_ _

__“you were trapped too.”_ _

__(Of course. You must have noticed, even you must have, that suddenly you didn’t need to work to remember who I was? That your friends remembered me too? I was free of that puerile fetter. Oh, time is so much more interesting when you’re not just watching the same tired events play out over and over again! Suddenly, I had the whole universe to study! Er. Have. Tenses are… tricky.) He lets out a wild giggle, and Sans tries not to wince._ _

__“don’t think people were meant to see so much, dad.” He mutters, and Gaster lets out another wild laugh._ _

__(Maybe not, son. Maybe not.) Gaster sounds distant, and hiding in that distance is something entirely unhinged._ _

__“...dad.”_ _

__(I see everything, you know. If I want. I’ve seen the big bang thousands of times. I’ve seen the absence thousands more. In some realities, it never happens. The switch never gets flipped. I’ve seen so many, many things. And in this timeline, I see one thing that… worries me.) The wild laughter is gone now, the strict disciplinarian back in its place. (This girl. This human. Your new… friend. She’s done something she shouldn’t have.)_ _

__He bristles, his eyes going hard without realizing it. “you leave her the fuck alone, gaster, or-”_ _

__(BE CALM.) Gaster roars, sounding furious. (OR YOU’LL WHAT, SON?) Sans doesn’t move. He doesn’t know. A minute creeps by, where he doesn’t say a goddamn thing, just keeps his eyes fixed on whatever Gaster’s pulled together to represent himself. (She stopped time.) Gaster finally says, as if nothing at all had happened. (Humans are good at that sort of thing, I know, they made the barrier, and then your little friend, down below… but this is new. This wasn’t a reset. This was stopping time. She made a bubble, a globe, just like the old sorcerers did when they made the barrier. A tiny one, but a globe all the same. She kept time out though, and she stayed aware and alive and she MOVED while she did stopped time in her bubble, and no matter how much magic she’s using, she shouldn’t be able to do that. I had to work very hard to talk to her in the first place.)_ _

__“i know. she told me.”_ _

__(At first, I was just interested. Here was something new!) Gaster chuckles. (But I’ve been thinking. Time is MINE. She can’t go grabbing pieces wherever she wants.) Sans snorts._ _

__“so what, whaddya want me to do? is this my dad tellin’ me to break up with my girlfriend, cuz’ i gotta say, you picked a hell of a time to decide to be back in my life and givin’ me fatherly advice. uh, no pun intended.”_ _

__(Again, such a persecution complex. No, you fool.) Gaster chuckles. (Why do you think I saved her in the first place?)_ _

__“uh, boredom, i assume. maybe you liked the challenge?” Sans proposes, and Gaster lets out another peel of unhinged laughter._ _

__(No, son, it’s because I saw what happened to you in all the timelines where she didn’t make it.) He whispers. (Oh, she didn’t survive in almost all of them. So many pretty girls in bloody piles in the snow. So many broken sons. It was painful, almost, to see you so pathetic. You might be a… what would you say, a piece of shit? But you’re my piece of shit. You always will be.)_ _

__There’s a sinking feeling beneath Sans’ ribs when he hears those words, as he tries, horrified, not to think about what his father had just said, about all the other universes where... He can’t. He can’t think about that._ _

__“then what? stop, uh, helpin’ her get magic?” He finally mutters, arching a browbone._ _

__(Again, son, I don’t really give a flying fuck. Have fun with her. Spend as much time as you like, be happy. Fornicate yourself senseless. I must say, I was a little surprised you were so terribly interested in that pursuit, given your biological composition. How can a skeleton even have the concept -)_ _

__“woah. we’re definitely not talking about this.” Sans says quickly, feeling like a petulant teenager suddenly. A terrified, horrified, petulant teenager. “and it’s about the most disgusting thing i can think of, if you’re watchin’-” He adds urgently, but is cut off by Gaster’s laughter._ _

__(Trust me. Of all the things in this universe I could watch - and I can, son, I can watch _ALL THE THINGS,_ but… that ranks just about rock bottom.) Gaster snorts. (Just… pass the message along, will you, son? No more time stops. Not ever. That’s not a privilege she’s earned.)_ _

__“...that’s it?” Sans mutters._ _

__(For now.) Gaster says lightly. (Now. I believe we both have things to do, and I must say, being in this dimension is exhausting. Time for us to go our separate ways, I think.)_ _

__“wait. wait!” Gaster’s already started to fade, but he stops, and looks at Sans patiently, if a pillar of shadows with a vague head-shape can be patient. “you said questions later. i have questions.”_ _

__(I suppose I did.) Gaster sighs._ _

__“how’d you get me here? you gotta machine to make shortcuts, somewhere in that dimension?” He demands quickly. Gaster chuckles._ _

__(No, son. Merely a different perspective. Most of time/space, I still struggle to punch through, but those places that you and your beau have cut doors into… well, Sans, you should know this better than most. They seal up, but it doesn’t take much to open them again. Nothing ever heals perfectly, and you’ve cut into this lab, and that room you were... sleeping in, often enough that it was easy to make a tunnel between the two.)_ _

__“...huh.” He’d never thought about that._ _

__(Anything else?) Gaster drawls._ _

__“yeah. what happens if she doesn’t take your recommendation. what if she stops time again?” Gaster thinks about this._ _

__(If she insists on being childish, and being in my family, then I will treat her like an errant child.) He finally pronounces._ _

__“bein’ in your family-” Sans says sharply, confused and worried. He remembers how he had been treated as an errant child._ _

__(Perhaps.) Gaster says. The shadow gives a tiny shrug. (Goodbye, Sans. Oh, and… give all my love to Papyrus, will you?) The reminder of his brother motivates Sans to say the thing a caring son should say, what Papyrus, who loved without question, would say:_ _

__“dad… look, i don’t think that place is good for you. i think you should come home.”_ _

__(No going home, son.) Click. Click. Click. (So much left to see…)_ _

__He’s gone._ _

__Sans holds still, trying not to shudder, for another long minute, then scrambles to cut a new hole, stepping quickly back into your bedroom and sealing the hole behind him, knowing it’ll never be strong enough. His very first thought is to check on you._ _

__You’re there. You’re asleep. You’re okay. Everything’s okay._ _

__As if you sense him at the side of the bed, you wake up, stretching and looking grumpy that your eyes are open, and like… oh god, the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen._ _

__“Hey.” You yawn, and then smile - god, that grumpiness never stays for long, and the way your eyes light up when you look at him, it’s enough to make him want to weep and wrap his arms around you and bare his teeth at time itself and scream that nobody gets to hurt you, ever ever again._ _

__“hey.” He reaches out and slides a hand through your hair, seeking reassurance._ _

__“You’re up already?” You whisper, looking pleasantly surprised for a second, before you register the expression on his face. Then, you only look worried._ _

__“long story.” Your brow furrows slightly at that one._ _

__“Wanna tell me? And, uh, do you still want that shower?”_ _

__He thinks of the reek of the lab, the sickness, the lurching shape of his father, the threat, the image of her dead and bloody in the snow, and he nods slowly._ _

__“yeah. i really, _really_ need one.” He shudders._ _


	60. In Which Everyone Is Doing Just Great

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I MISSED YOU  
> I'm SO GLAD EXAMS ARE OVER  
> AND HIATUS IS OVER  
> AND I HAVE A LOT OF FANART TO SHARE BUT I AM LAZY AND SLEEPY NOW SO IT'LL WAIT FOR TOMORROW  
> I LOVE U

It’s weird, seeing him this out of sorts. Oh, sure, you’ve seen him upset before - probably way too often. But this was…

“Baby, what happened?” You ask quietly, watching him run his hand over his skull as he waited for the water to warm up - you’ve managed to migrate to the bathroom, and are doing your very best to act like you’re totally comfortable just having a butt naked conversation. Which, well, you’d done before, but it’s still a little weird! The, er, sudden nature of your relationship (and subsequent cohabitation - well, fuck, it wasn’t even subsequent, he’d moved in before you’d even been on a date!) had you discovering these odd moments where you found yourself still a little unsure.

He’s in another world, though, he’s not even covertly checking you out, and that’s so different from his behavior recently that it has you fully spooked. 

“my dad. our pal. sent me on a little trip this morning.” He finally pronounces, stepping promptly into the shower. You run that sentence through your head a few times before speaking. 

“Whaaaaat.” God, when are you going to master the art of normal responses? You push the shower curtain out of the way and step in after him. “Please. Expound on that thought. Elaborate.” You urge. 

“woke up in the lab. underground. creepiest goddamn place.” He mutters, reaching around you for the bar of soap and running it vaguely over his ribs. You get the sense this isn’t strictly necessary for him, but it seems to be making him feel better. 

“How-”

“he’s been figuring some stuff out. lots of stuff, apparently. he can open a door anywhere we’ve opened doors, babe.” Sans mutters, and you blink. 

“Ew, so he was in our bedroom? Oh, oh, EW. What? EW.”

“i know. look. it gets worse.” Sans sighs, giving you an extremely apologetic look as you try not to think about the possibility that his dad had seen you naked. But, well, it does get worse. As he explains his encounter with Gaster your skin begins to crawl, and you’re shaking your head unhappily before he even gets to the punchline. He seems totally horrified, and worse, bleak in a way that you just haven’t seen on him before. He seems like the ordeal has sapped him. And telling you Gaster’s purpose in visiting the third dimension is clearly the most painful for him; he doesn’t meet your eyes, and he practically whispers, in his deep rumble, when he gets to that bit.

“He came to tell you… to tell me… not to stop time?” You try out. Sans winces and nods, his eyes dim. “Oh. Jeez. Okay.”

“okay?”

“Okay, I won’t stop time. I mean, I have no idea how I did it in the first place, but I’ll, you know, not do it again.” You say with a shrug.

“...babe.” Sans is staring at you like he can’t figure you out. “we can work something out, i don’t want you to feel like he can control-”

“Sans, I don’t like seeing you like this. I’ll do whatever’s necessary to keep him from freaking you out like this again.” You say quickly. “Besides, it’s not like… I don’t know, like something I was born with or anything. It’s something I did once, and almost nobody noticed, you know? It’s cool. Let him… god, this is weird. Let him hang out in the fourth dimension or whatever. Let him be in charge of time. As long as he leaves you alone.” You sigh, feeling somewhat strange that this level of magical weirdness is beginning to feel normal. 

“yeah?” Sans doesn’t seem particularly convinced.

“Yeah. I just want you to be okay. That’s my biggest concern right now.” You tell him quietly, leaning forward to kiss his skull, which is beaded with stray droplets of water. Almost as an afterthought, when you pull away, you glance down at his chest and focus in that in-between way. You jerk with surprise - you’re used to seeing his soul so bright, barely contained beneath his ribs, but right now, it’s…

Dull. 

“what?” Sans is watching you, and he follows your gaze for a second, looking down at his chest before sucking in a breath between his teeth. “oh.”

“...Sans-”

“don’t freak out. used to always look like this, underground.” He interjects, sounding just a little worried, and you realize just how much being back there again when he hadn’t expected it, feeling like he’s under the thumb of his dad again, how it’s chipping away at him. You’d felt the pit of black despair he’d lived in before he escaped the barrier. When you’d touched his soul, you’d seen that, vividly, how much it had taken for him just to get out of bed, to do anything, so convinced in the futility of the effort, the knowledge that it would get wiped away by a reset, that he could barely rouse himself for anything at all. 

God, you hated knowing that you’d slept soundly while something had happened to him that had caused his soul to fade so much.

“I’m not gonna let him hurt you again.” You mutter firmly, fingers fanning out on his sternum without even thinking, clean bone against clean bone. You want to make this better so badly-

“hey.” Sans says quietly, and you realize that you’d been reaching with your mind too, trying to … well, physically just fix it. But, right, you remembered what Undyne said, that touching souls wasn’t something that monsters did lightly. 

“Shit, sorry, I really wasn’t thinking.” You say quickly, pulling your hand away, and he shakes his head. 

“s’okay. just feelin’... i don’t think you wanna touch it right now.” He says quietly. “it’d make you feel pretty…” He shakes his head slowly, trailing off, and you sigh softly, and wrap both arms around him. 

“I know. I know how you feel.” You whisper, thinking of how distressed he’d been when he’d seen you, that first night he’d torn open a door to the void, that day Paula had suddenly and unceremoniously forced her way back to your life via that shitty, awful television interview. He’d been so horrified, looking at you - he’d been ready to send some humans to the void forever because he could see how hurt your soul was.

And now Gaster had forced his way back into Sans’ life; and in doing so, he’d showed just how easily he could hurt Sans. Could hurt either of you. No wonder his soul wasn’t shining particularly brightly. 

“i know you do.” He replies quietly, and nuzzles into your neck, hanging onto you under the soft cascade of water. “later, okay? just need a little time to…” He takes a deep breath, his ribs rising and falling in reaction to the operation of invisible lungs, and he twines his fingers in your hair, still holding quite close to you. 

“Yeah.” You sigh, and kiss him softly, after meeting his eyes for a second first. “Let’s… let’s get out of here today, okay? Do something outside, let you see the sky a little bit? No need to... science today, let’s do something you’d like.” 

“heh. i like science.” He laughs tiredly, then smiles at you. “but… yeah, okay. that sounds great. we’ve got one day of vacation left anyway. can we bring paps?”

“Duh.” You say fondly, and kiss his forehead. “C’mon, baby. As much as I like hanging out with you in the shower, let’s get out of here.” He snorts at that, and you finish cleaning yourself quickly, noticing a few tender areas here and there - he’d been holding you pretty tight last night, though you hadn’t noticed until just now. At least there seemed to be no new embarrassing marks. He notices that you’re taking stock of your current state, and he shyly asks,

“hey, uh, you feelin’ okay?” You snort, and nod quickly. 

“Um. I feel bad saying this, but I feel amazing? Like, wow, last night was… I mean, even forgetting the weird magic aspect, um, heh…. you know, unbelieveable, but right now? I feel like I could take on the world, magic-wise, and I’m pretty damn sure I’ve got you to thank for that, so...” You trail up, cheeks feeling warm, but it’s okay. He cracks a genuine smile as you talk, and seems a fraction more cheerful by the end of your rambling explanation.

“heh. glad i could help.” He says, arching a browbone.

“Mmm, there’s the smug boyfriend I was expecting this morning. Figured he’d show up sometime.” You laugh, stretching slowly and reaching around him to turn the water off. 

“yeah, sorry, i was planning on being really goddamn sweet to cover for my smugness before i got kidnapped and vaguely threatened by my asshole kinda-father, who’s apparently been spying on me throughout space and time.” He’s witheringly dry, but the sarcasm isn’t directed at you, he’s just… god, he’s furious at the whole situation.

“Well, sure. Who hasn’t had that happen to them.” You say, stepping out of the shower and trying not to think of the prospect of Gaster somehow watching you right now. 

“totally standard.” Sans sighs. “sorry again, babe… he just crawls under my skin. metaphorically, of course. i really was gonna be a great boyfriend, i was gonna make you breakfast and bring it to you in bed and maybe even eat an egg or something-”

“You’re the best boyfriend.” You hush him. “Look. We’ll go downstairs, eat breakfast or whatever, say hi to everyone, grab Paps and maybe Frisk?” You hesitate, but he nods quickly, “and then get the hell out of here.” You conclude. “Sounds perfect to me.”

“me too.” He says, and forces a smile back on his face.   
_________________________

Downstairs is… something. It is certainly something. Nobody’s managed to clean up that much after the party - there’s stray streamers and noisemakers everywhere. Frisk is in the TV room with that monster kid without arms (who must have slept over), a waffle in their hand -no plate in sight-, with a giant glass of chocolate milk and Steven Universe blasting on the TV. They yawn and wave their milk vaguely at you when you and Sans walk through, and the other kid leans over to take a bite of the waffle Frisk is holding, not even diverting their attention from the TV.

In the kitchen, things have gone right to hell. Lawyerpants - in a different but still immaculate suit - is nearly comatose at the kitchen table, looking like he has the hangover of a lifetime. Papyrus, who hasn’t touched a drop of alcohol (perhaps ever) is cooking enormous batches of brunch food, oblivious to the fact that almost nobody has the stomach to eat it.

Alphys is seated at the other end of the kitchen table, wearing a bathrobe and looking bleary, and Undyne is seated crosslegged on the floor, drinking a bloody mary with what looks like grim determination. It takes a second for all of this to sink in.

“Hey buddy.” Lawyerpants croaks. 

“uh, hey.” Sans says, looking a little amused in spite of his bleak mood. “you-”

“Toriel asked me to be here, in case Frisk’s bio … uggggh.” Lawyerpants has to take a break in the middle of his sentence to groan, expressing the utter misery of his hungover predicament. “Bio mom showed up. Hell.” Sans makes a noise that is a very poorly disguised snicker, and Undyne whimpers quietly. You’re busy feeling nine kinds of stupid that you’d managed to forget - again - that Paula had threatened to do _something_ if she wasn’t given the deed to the house by today.

“Oh, god. Thanks, Lawyerpants, I’m sure you had… other things you’d rather be doing.” You sigh, thinking of the pretty human he’d been talking to the previous night. Then again, sleep might be one of them. 

“D’worry. Happy to help.” Lawyerpants tells the table, and Undyne groans. 

“Too loud.” She complains, taking another sip of the bloody mary. 

“Undyne, why are you-” You attempt. 

“Hair of the dog.” She hisses, letting her head loll back against the wooden siding of the kitchen island. “Sans, try one of these, you’d like em, it’s like spicy ketchup with vodka.”

“...huh. that does sound good.”

“HUMAN! WHILE NOBODY WAS SUPERVISING ME I HAD FOUR CUPS OF COFFEE!” Papyrus interrupts to announce, at such a volume that everyone but you and Sans lets out a groan of despair. You try not to giggle as Sans mutters, 

“dear lord god.” 

“H-he’s been cooking for hours.” Alphys yawns. “Did y-you guys have a good night?”

“Oh, right, yeah.” Undyne looks up, reaching beneath her eyepatch to scratch an itch under her bad eye. “You guys finally bang real good-like?”

“uh. heh.” Sans stammers, caught off guard. Not that he’d been nearly subtle enough last night to have any right to be surprised, you think irritably, trying not to blush. 

“They weren’t already banging?” The miserable lawyer drawls, his head buried in his arms, then groans yet again. “That was out loud.” He observes. 

“WHAT’S ‘BANGING?’”

“ok. that’s enough of new year's day for me.” Sans sighs, looking at his brother, while Undyne and Alphys snicker unpleasantly and you consider the morality of punching the severely hungover. Lawyerpants makes an awful noise, and for a second you fear the worst, that he’s going to lose his breakfast, but he manages to catch his breath and settles back down, prone, on the table. “where’s tori and asgore?”

“Bow chicka wow wow.” Undyne and Alphys supply, simultaneously exhausted, miserable, and thrilled in equal measure. 

“Means banging.” Lawyerpants groans.

“Hoo boy.” You grab a few slices of buttered toast and an orange, then turn to Sans. “Let’s go outside, baby, I am not mentally prepared for any of this.”

“paps, bud, you wanna go for a walk?” Sans tries, but Papyrus will have none of it. 

“ABSOLUTELY NOT, THERE’S SO MUCH TO DO HERE. FOR EXAMPLE, I NEED TO MAKE MORE COFFEE. ALSO, GHOST IS EXCELLENT AT RECEIVING REPORTS, THANK YOU FOR THE SUGGESTION, _________.” He crows. Another groan goes up, strictly volume related this time. 

“ok. ok pal.” Sans turns to you, a crooked smile on his face. He’s clearly enjoying the schadenfreude a little too much, but you’re not in the mood to scold him. “where we goin’?” He asks you, and you smile. 

“Let’s go to the park at the peak.” You suggest, nodding to the looming shape of Mt. Ebott on the other side of the bay, out the kitchen window. It’s the highest spot in town, which you think might improve his mood. Sans nods quickly, and traces a doorway before you can. He steps through first - he always does when he’s uncertain what’ll be on the other side, you note. You’re halfway through the doorway after him, hearing the joyful screech of Spot, when you hear Sans speak clearly, addressing someone you can’t see on the other side. 

“now… now what the fuck are _you_ doing here?”

Well. That can’t be good.


	61. In Which Sans is in a Great Mood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, if you don't follow me on [my tumblr](totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com) you've totally missed out on some "deleted scenes" over the course of hiatus, so I've gathered them all together into one glorious place:
> 
>  
> 
> [ Delete or Be Deleted ](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6122618/chapters/14032775)
> 
>  
> 
> LOOK I NEVER CLAIMED TO BE GREAT AT NAMING.
> 
> I'm also still miles behind in sorting through all fanart to share, so be patient, I will fix it when I am (again) less sleepy. TST went skiing today and she is v. v. sleepy. Poor TST.

You’re barely through the door when a hyper-caffeinated skeleton screams at you that humans need to dress warmer and throws your coat through the doorway. For a moment, you’re too distracted by the sensation of Spot screeching wildly in your brain as you cross through the portal, and then the cold air hits you. Oh, right. You pick the coat up distractedly, sliding it on, and try to find the source of Sans’ irritation on the other side of the doorway. 

You’re totally braced for Jerry - hell, you were so certain it was going to be Jerry that you were already trying to think of things to say to calm Sans down while still making sure that Jerry didn’t touch you (because, well, sticky), but when you step around Sans to see who he’s yelling at, you discover that Sans is glaring at a small, sheepish looking flower. A flower with a face. 

Is … _sheepish_ the right word? 

“Uh.” You say, carefully closing the door behind you. “What’s the matter?” Sans blinks, and grits his teeth. 

“he…” He begins, tightly, then grimaces. “i don’t… uh...” His eyes are narrowed, his hands clenched into fists as he looks at the small plant, but he can’t manage to articulate anything, or even really do anything more than unconsciously take a step in front of you, as if he’s trying to shield you from any danger the plant might present. 

The flower observes this for a moment.

“Well, gosh.” It finally speaks, a soft, childlike voice. “You should tell your pal here to relax, human.” He makes a gesture with two leaves - a shrug. Sans is still glaring, but for once, he’s totally lost for words. “Whatever bad blood the two of us have is behind us. The barrier’s down. That chapter’s closed. And even a monster like me deserves to see the sun every once in a while. Live and let live, right? That’s what Frisk would say?” He says brightly, a sardonic smile on his little face. You almost recognize that smile, but then... “Golly, I’m upsetting the big guy. I’ll come back later. See ya!” He says, and without further ado, he burrows down into the ground, and he’s gone. You stare, bewildered, at the tiny hole in the ground, the only evidence that a weird talking flower was there in the first place. 

“...Okay. What was that?” You mutter. Sans is staring hard at the hole too, shaking his head. 

“fuck.” He whispers, then looks up at you. “i, uh… goddamn it. damn. i can’t tell you why. i don’t know why. but i hate that guy.” He says, rubbing his skull again. You wonder if he can get headaches.

“He… said you had bad blood?” You say quietly. “You don’t-”

“can’t remember. must not have happened, this timeline.” Sans grimaces. “fuck, i _hate_ it when people mess around with time!” He snaps, his eye flashing, then immediately, apologetically, glances at you. “uh, present company excluded.” You shake your head quickly, letting him know you aren’t insulted. “would be so much easier if i didn’t almost remember it!” He hisses, frustrated, and then takes a look around. “oh. wow. nice view. i’ve never been up here.” He observes, distractedly.

It is a nice view. The summit of Mt. Ebott had once been totally closed to the public - it had only been researchers and EbbCo employees up here, when you were a kid. However, after the barrier had fallen, the company had sold almost all of its suddenly useless mountainside land, and the summit had been converted into a public park, popular with tourists and hikers in the summer. This time of year, it was nearly desolate; looking around, you could only see a few brave humans, bundled up, from a distance. 

The view was phenomenal, of course; you could see the town of Mt. Ebott nestled into the foot of the mountain, and the ocean spreading beyond that. You could even see, across the bay- “look. s’our house.” Sans points out, still sounding very out of sorts. 

“Uh. Yeah.” You say, staring at him rather than across the bay. “Sans, you just got in a fight with a flower, though.” You’re not about to let that particular brand of weirdness slide. You’ve seen a lot of bizarre things with him, but a fight with a flower is … well, it’s straining your tolerance for weird shit. He lets out a strangled laugh at that.

“not a flower. not really. i don’t think that’s it’s real form. and… that thing’s no good. whatever it is. didn’t you notice?” His tone is one of faint horror.

“Notice what?” You say, shivering in spite of the coat you have on when you see the look in his dim, distant pupils. 

“no soul.” Sans says darkly. “the thing knows frisk, too. i wish that damn kid would just tell me-”

“Hey, buddy, you be nice when you’re talking about my cousin.” You chide automatically, taking a step back to regard him, and he groans, shaking his head again. 

“sorry. sorry. you’re right. just…” He takes a deep breath, staring out at the horizon with fixed intensity, taking a step forward to hold tight onto the railing erected to keep people from falling down the cliffside to their doom. “what gaster said. gaster said it was easy, in the barrier, to reset time. frisk could do it. i’m goddamn sure of it. i am one hundred percent certain frisk was fucking around with time down there-”

“Sans.” You warn again, strongly disliking his tone at the moment. He looks over at you, shudders, and groans. 

“again. sorry. not on my best game today. i love frisk, you know that, right? frisk is family. i’d do anything for the kid.” He says simply. “and i know they went through a lot down there, but… god. woulda been easier, if i didn’t realize it was happening, when they reset. or if i remembered everything that happened. would be so much easier if frisk would just tell me what they knew about what happened down there. either way.” He grinds his teeth slightly, trying to keep a smile on his face. 

“You said it was bad…” You say cautiously, glancing over your shoulder to make sure nobody’s eavesdropping. 

“nobody else seemed to realize how many times we’d lived the same days over and over again. i did. i could tell… came up with codewords and everything, to try and prove to myself it was happening.” He rubs his skull. “fuck.” He shudders. “that little shit flowey was part of it, i know it-”

“What did you just call him?” You say, and he says, as if it’s obvious, 

“flowey. ...oh.” He realizes, as you have, that the flower had not introduced himself, and he shudders again. “goddamn it does my dad have some excellent timing. what a fucking day…” Your brow furrows as you join him at the railing, and slowly the enormity of what Sans had been telling you dawns on you, and you are downright furious. 

“Your dad’s a real asshole.” You finally pronounce, this sense crystallizing suddenly in your mind. He looks up at you, confused by your vehemence. 

“hey, i’m not denying it, but-”

“Look, if what you told me is true, then your dad could have come to talk to you at literally any point in time. Why choose today, if he didn’t know something else was going to happen to mess with your head later? He’s… he’s _toying with you._ ” You say, meeting his eyes. Sans looks surprised, in spite of his bleak mood. 

“shit... you’re right.” He says, blinking. “s’why he showed up today, huh? supposed to be some lesson for me about messing with time?” He exhales slowly, then forces a smile on his face. “message received, old man.” He drawls, glancing up at the sky.

He holds still long enough that you’re just about to clear your throat and say something, when he finally looks back at you, a more determined expression on his face. “look, if he wants me to sit around and sulk about what he did, he’s gonna be disappointed. c’mon, babe, let’s do what we came here to do.”

“Hm?” You blink at his sudden change of heart. 

“go on a date. be outside. get un-freaked out.” He reminds you with a tired smile. 

“Oh, god, I wanted to take you somewhere better than a cold mountain with creepy flowers, when I picked a date.” You say, blindsided. “I know a pretty good dive bar downtown, they do standup-”

“we can go there too. but you were right.” He cuts you off, looking at you with genuine affection. “i needed to be outside. and look. there wasn’t a reset. even with gaster. even with that creepy-ass flower, we’re okay.” He says, looking over the bay again. “still here.”

“Yeah. Still here.” You mutter, and lean against him slightly, still at the rail, looking across the bay. When you look over at him next, his eyes are no longer on the horizon, or the sky, or your house, or anything you’d expect. They’re busily sweeping the water. You realize with a start what he’s probably looking for. “Uh.” You clear your throat. “They, uh… you know, they removed the car wreckage. You won’t be able to find where my parents crashed, I mean.” He glances up, his cheeks bright blue.

“god, you can read me way too easy, you know that?” He finally says. “goddamn. i’m sorry. i shouldn’t have -”

“No. I always do the same thing.” You admit. “No matter where I am, if I can see the bay or the mountain, I’m trying to figure out where they must have started to slip on the ice- if they started to slip.” You correct, feeling Sans’ eyes on you. He sighs and shakes his head again. 

“babe, i didn’t mean to make you think about that. can we just …” He looks down at his dirty converse sneakers - you kept meaning to get him a new pair. “you’ve been having such a bad time. cuz of us. me.” He finally mutters, sounding wretched. You don’t quite care for this tone either.

“Sans.” You warn, but he forges on. 

“you start hanging out with monsters and what, we lead those assholes right to your door. your car gets wrecked. your front yard gets bombed. your aunt gets back in your life. your private life gets spilled on international tv. oh, you lose half your goddamn arm, can’t forget that. your boyfriend’s dad threatens you while you sleep. and your boyfriend’s busy making you think about how your parents died because he can’t stand to leave a goddamn mystery alone-”

“Please. Stop.” You say, drawing away from him slightly. “I know we’re having a rough day, but…” He grimaces up at you, still trying to smile. “I’m happy. I love you. I love you so much, and I hate that you’re feeling so bad. But, Sans. This, us, it’s not bad, and I think you know that.” You sigh, reaching to stroke the back of his skull as reassuringly as possible. “Please don’t come up with ways to make yourself the bad guy. I love you.” You repeat.

“it’s just… it’s just occurring to me today.” He finally breathes. “i clearly can’t promise you much, babe. being with me, i can’t promise you normal. can’t promise you won’t get hurt, or that you won’t be a target because you’re with me.” 

“I’m a target already.” You say, raising your right arm pointedly, and his smile grows more forced. 

“i know. you’ll have to fight to pass as normal, even if you split. thanks to me.” 

You close your eyes, trying to gather your thoughts. “C’mon.” You finally sigh. “Come with me.” 

“uh. where?” He pushes himself off the railing, all the same. 

“Somewhere private where nobody’s gonna walk in on us.” You say firmly, and he blinks. 

“...uh.” He says again, and almost against his will, an eyebrow twitches a query for a second. 

“Oh, christ. No. Not for that.” You sigh, wondering how he has room in his skull for dirty thoughts with all that misery pressing down on him. He lets out a guilty, quick chuckle, and, when he sees that you’re extending your hand, takes it instantly. 

He’s right, though. As you walk in the direction of the path back down the mountain, you can feel the pressure of eyes on you, on the both of you. The few humans you drew within a hundred feet of were definitely staring at the odd couple the two of you struck as you walked hand in hand down the path. You can practically hear Sans’ voice - see? - though he stays mercifully quiet. 

He’s silent until you’re a quarter of the way down the mountain, when you pull sharply off the trail, into the sparse trees covering this side of the mountain. 

“where are we-”

“EbbCo observation station. I’ve still got the old keys, I bet they never changed the locks.” You say quietly, nodding forward as a small watchtower of corrugated sheet metal materializes from behind a rocky outcropping. 

“why’d you have the keys?”

“I used to spend a lot of time up here, when I was a kid.” You tell him, then shrug. “Suppose we could just open a door inside, but-”

“yeah. thinking we should be more careful with that, since my dad can use them as doorways.” Sans speaks up, and you nod quickly. 

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ve been thinking that’s smart.” You shrug, and scale the small ladder to the observation platform, then cross your fingers and try your luck at the door. It opens with only mild protest, and you smile down at Sans, in spite of your rather serious mood. “C’mon up.” You walk inside the tiny room, smiling at the familiar setup - not much, if anything, has changed here in terms of decor since your parents died - there’s still the same desks, the big one way windows, the office chairs, the ancient telephone with the curly cord, the poster on the wall reading “Hang in there, buddy!” All the machinery is gone though. Well, of course. It was designed to get readings from the barrier, and there’s no more barrier.

Sans closes (and locks) the door after you, then glances around in appreciation. “huh. interesting.” He mutters, then blinks at you. “why are we-” His eyes widen slightly, as you slowly, very deliberately, manage to manifest your soul outside your body for him to see. “babe…”

“You said you didn’t want me to touch yours. Heh. Sorry, being immature, just… phrasing. Anyway, that’s fine. It’s your call. But if you’re thinking the way you’ve just told me, I need you to understand that it’s in your head right now, that you’re hurting me, and I don’t think you’re in a place right now to trust just my words.” You clear your throat. “So here. You wanna know how I feel, please. See for yourself.” He stares at you, mystified. 

“you’re sure-”

“I am absolutely certain.” You say firmly. He grinds his teeth one last time, looking distressed, then nods.

*****************************

He thinks you’re going to regret this. 

Well, he does and he doesn’t. Part of him knows you won’t, but that part of him, the part that’s been so good at speaking up lately, is just overshadowed entirely by this bleak horror that he’s fighting to keep at bay. God, he’s horrified at how little it takes, to get him from feeling like the happiest being to ever walk the planet all the way down to where he is now. He’s backsliding something fierce in the past few hours, allowing himself to embrace that grim certainty that he should just give up -

But no. He doesn’t give up. He’d learned that, in the resets, that giving up was the worst. Even if he couldn’t remember exactly what happened, those times he never even got out of bed, he knew that trying was always, always better than succumbing to that dark hole within him.

Very cautiously, he raises a finger. 

“you’ll tell me if i need to stop?” He looks over you again, and you nod again. You look so stubborn, so resolute (so determined, so beautiful that it’ll hurt like hell when you choose to leave - stop it, Sans, fuck you, Sans!). 

You also look a tiny bit scared. 

He stretches his fingers a little closer - all those molecules, and the spaces between those molecules, and how did you ever know when there was little enough void between two things that they were considered to be touching? You shot an arrow, and at a certain point it was halfway to the target, then it was half of halfway, then half of that, and a mathematician would say that it never actually struck, that it was always halfway there, but at some point, real life stepped in, and the arrow in real life sunk into the target and -

Oh - oh, god, if there was a god, if there was anything working out there to make systems, to make order out of chaos, it had created its masterwork when it came to you.

The sensation of your soul surges through him, burning away that miasma of barely settled depression like the sun scorching away fog on a hot day, and he sees you so clearly - last time, it had only lasted this long, he’d only been able to feel you so bright, so determined, the briefest taste of knowing you, before you’d started to cry and he’d gotten spooked. But now…

Oh, now. 

Your soul is a book, maybe, with two bright, perfect chapters - the first, your childhood, the childhood every kid dreams about, the love you’d been shown, the faith, the delight your parents had taken in your accomplishments, the way it had felt to know you were safe and loved and cared for.

And then the middle, god, the middle of the book was not fun at all, it was a part he needed to understand but he didn’t like to delve into, the pain, the certitude you’d had that you, somehow, deserved this, that if you’d done something differently, if you’d called your parents, taken the bus, something, anything, a butterfly flapping its wings and your parents would still be alive. 

A flame forcing itself to be an ember, to be unremarkable, to smoulder into nothing. The brief stabs of hope, and the utter despair when that hope was for nothing, over and over again in those dark chapters.

But then! It’s not his face, it’s not the sense of him, that opens that new chapter. It’s Undyne. Of course it is, he thinks, and while he’s touching your soul, he sees Undyne the way that you see Undyne; so brave, so caring, so goddamn funny, so stubborn, so embarrassing, so loving - and god, he needs to thank her, he needs to do something, anything, to express his gratitude for making you feel those things. Her, and then Alphys, you’d met Alphys, you’d adored Alphys, but then it was _him,_ and then so much, so much of your life was him.

You’d woven him through you like a bright thread in a tapestry. He was in every single part of you, in all the empty space, you’d held him, because you needed him and loved him like he’d never imagined he could be needed or loved. The furrow of his brow when he’s thinking. The way he looks at you, at Papyrus, at Frisk… The set of his jaw while he read. The way he left his clothes all around the room - god, what was wrong with you, who would love someone enough to find that an endearing trait, he almost laughs, almost ruins it, but damn if it doesn’t just make him love you more.

And at last he can see from your perspective, he can see that all the bad things he’d listed off, all the terrible things that he’d thought he’d caused, that you don’t give a shit about causation, not one bit, because you’d lived twelve years of terrible things, twelve years of waiting for the other shoe to drop, and terrible things were nothing new to you - but this time, for once, you had him to love you, you had him, and Undyne, and Papyrus and Alphys. Mettaton. Frisk - oh god, you adored Frisk so much, he couldn’t even think about that fear he sometimes had, looking Frisk in the eye, when he saw Frisk through your eyes. You had Toriel and Asgore. Lesser Dog. Spot. Him. Him. Him. Over and over again, you found new ways to delight in the fact that you had him, and that he loved you and that you had touched his soul and you knew it-

“Sans.” You’re breathing hard, eyes fixed on him, and you’re so goddamn beautiful, and he can barely-

“_________.” He whispers, clutching to the moment; his pointer finger traces along the curved side of your soul, and you both shudder, losing focus for a moment, too busy, too lost in each other, but then it happens again, and he notices it this time, and draws his hand away, trying to catch his breath.

There’s an antique telephone sitting on the desk in the deserted observational tower, faded yellowing plastic, a curly looping cord connecting the receiver to the base. 

It’s ringing.


	62. In Which Things Get Ooky Spooky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY FANART KETCHUP TIME
> 
>  
> 
> [REPORT TO GHOST](http://fakeivy1412.tumblr.com/post/140261917056/um-i-cant-remember-what-i-wrote-when-i-submitted)  
> [SKARM BIRD](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140129195281/submitted-by-donchakno-flippin-the-skarm-bird)  
> [I really love this reader interpretation](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140129135881/submitted-by-designhawk-some-skarm-fanart-for)  
> [every skarm is good skarm](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140047520781/i-drew-my-reader-from-cobc-sorry-it-so-shitty-i)  
> [The Sans in this one cracks me up](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139943034806/submitted-by-thatstrangechick-i-drew-the-reader)  
> [Booty 4 DAAAAYS](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139770713661/submitted-by-asrielis-id-like-to-call-this-one)  
> [I love this style so much](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139759638261/stargurrl5-from-chill-or-be-chilled-undertale)  
> [NOOGIES](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139642087181/so-after-reading-the-newest-deleted-scene-and)  
> [same.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139216123621/submitted-by-actuallyrosequartz-so-i-was-looking)  
> [Blue. Balls.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139200326411/submitted-by-donchakno-oh-god-this-is-just-a-wip)  
> [AND SPOT 2](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/139172409256/submitted-by-silvershadow13100-i-drew-my-version)

You want to stay here and just bask as his hand runs over your soul, and everything becomes so perfect. You’d been watching him so closely, your vision narrowed on that dim, dull glow in his chest, and you’d seen exactly what one touch, one fingertip brushing against your soul had done to him. It had been a chemical ignition, an unstoppable reaction. A dam breaking. Mentos being dropped into Diet Coke. 

...Okay, maybe that last one was a little silly, you’d thought, trying to breathe steadily. But it had been that forceful, that dramatic - one tiny brush, and his soul had flared back to life, as bright as you’d ever seen it, and the look on his face, the recognition of a crushing weight lifted off him, it had been one of the most wonderful things you’d ever seen. After that, you’d expected him to pull away, but then realized, with a thrill of absolute delight, that there was no reason he had to pull away, that he was going to keep his hand where it was. 

You were more prepared, this time, for the way it felt to be so exposed, so unprotected, but you didn’t flinch upon that realization, because, well, you knew him down to the core of his soul, and you knew he would never, ever hurt you. This time, you could simply enjoy it. And enjoy it you certainly had. You didn’t know what was going through his head, didn’t know what he was discovering about you this time, but you knew this; nothing compared to the way you felt when he touched your soul. 

Uh, maybe not “nothing.” You could think of a few moments from just the previous night that had forced you to fundamentally reassess the upper limits of pleasure - oh god, when he’d finally finished inside of you last night (the first time), after days of mutual frustration... the instant, simultaneous physical release on your own part, combined with that indescribable feeling of his magic rushing into you, god, not to mention the satisfaction of the hoarse, disbelieving way he’d been groaning your name, and that look of overwhelming, astonishing love in his eyes -

Well. You’d thought you’d discovered the maximum of how good a person could possibly feel then, but this… oh, this was easily as incredible, but so different, so different that you can barely believe one man could make you feel like he had last night in bed, and then today, make you feel like this. He touched you, and you felt invincible. Nothing could hurt you with this man by your side. He touched you and you felt vulnerable; he softened those parts of you that had grown hard and intractable over the years, he made you realize, all at once, that the shell you had built could weigh you down. He touched you, and you felt whole. Beautiful. Awestruck. Blessed. Healed. And yet, there was that common thread between last night and right now, that incredible, unbelievable love he had for you, that he was willing to share, no, that he _needed_ to give you, the same way you needed to breathe. 

You’re thinking, somehow, in the distant corner of your brain, that you need to give him something in return - you want him to feel this, you want him to know how much you love everything about him, and your hand is rising on its own volition (though for the life of you, you couldn’t tell later if you were reaching for his soul or for the waistband of his pants - they’d both seemed like perfectly wonderful ideas at the time).

And the goddamn phone had to ring

“Sans.” You gasp - oh, it isn’t fair! You can’t even bring yourself to worry about it just yet, who could possibly be calling here, now. You just can’t believe that you’re being interrupted, when you need this, and - 

“_________.” He breathes, and your heart flutters erratically. His voice caresses your name, and it’s enough right now to make you forget about the phone entirely - his finger _strokes_ your soul, and you nearly lose your balance, goosebumps rippling over your body, the rush surging down to the bony tips of your fingers. He looks just as staggered by the gesture, and you need to at least, at the very least, kiss him, but then - goddamn it, it rings again, because it’s a phone and those stupid things tend to do that. 

He pulls his hand away and some basic survival instinct comes rushing back. Breathing hard, you stare at the phone, pulling your soul back into yourself. 

“oh. oh fuck i love you.” He needs to get that thought out first, before he does anything else.

“I love you too. I love you so much.” You whisper, closing the distance between the two of you and leaning against him. His arms move protectively around you, and the phone rings again, and suddenly you’re furious that anyone dare interrupt you right now. 

“Answering it.” You tell him, and he blinks at you, nuzzling your neck for a heartbeat, but he doesn’t argue, to your relief. You snatch the phone up from the receiver, before you can reconsider the wisdom of doing so.

“Hello?” You say quickly. 

“Good morning.” The voice on the other end is creaky, tired, and instantly familiar. “This is Doris Aberdeen, calling on behalf of EbbCo. Our security system is indicating that research tower four on Mount Ebott was unlocked today, but nobody’s cleared for access -”

“Doris?” This is actually the last person on earth you expected to hear on the other end of the phone call. Your face heats up with embarrassment, the mental image of the woman on the other end of the call bringing you instantly and immediately back down to earth. “Oh! Gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize this was still active, uh, the observation tower, oh… oh man, sorry Doris!” 

“May I ask with whom I am speaking?” Doris says, with the slightest amount of hesitation in her familiar voice. 

“Oh. Oh, jeez, yeah, sorry, it’s, uh… _______. _________ __________, you know, um, my mom and dad were-”

“__________?!” There’s a pause, while Doris processes this. At last, your father’s former secretary gasps, sounding absolutely delighted, not to mention astonished. “Sweetie! How long has it been, oh, gracious! What on _earth_ are you doing in a research tower at the top of Mt. Ebott on New Year's Day!? My goodness!” You let out a relieved, guilty laugh. 

“Doris, I’m so, so sorry. I honestly thought the tower must have been bought back up with the city when they made the summit site into a park. I was just showing my friend-” Sans’ eyes narrow at that slight, and you sigh and try again, “er, my boyfriend, I was showing him all the places up here mom and dad used to take me when I was a kid. I remembered I still had the master key so I figured I’d try… oh, I’m really embarrassed.” You sigh helplessly, feeling your cheeks heat. Sans, now realizing that this isn’t the next nightmarish threat, is beginning to smile at the awkward look on your face - you’re certain that Doris will think that you two young lovers had snuck into the tower to get amorous in private, and worse, that suspicion isn’t that far off from the mark. 

“Oh, shh!” Doris laughs, still sounding so pleased to be speaking to you. “Sweetie, you’d better come down here to the base station and give me that key, though. You know what a stickler Mr. Capra is about security - oh, don’t worry, you’re not in any trouble!” She guesses your fear before you speak up. “Your parents built EbbCo, hon, as far as we’re all concerned I’m sure you can still have free run of the place, but Mr. Capra’ll be pretty cranky with security to know there was a key unaccounted for all this time. Oh, goodness, it’ll be so good to see you, honey, how long has it -”

“Twelve years.” You say with a rueful laugh. The silence on the other end of the line grows a little awkward, maybe, but then Doris says, 

“Well, honey, I think this is probably destiny that we got back in touch today, because I brought in five pans of lemon bars and brownies, and I forgot that all these young people would be taking New Years’ off, so come on down and I’ll send some home with you.” She sounds so pleased with the arrangement that you have to smile. 

“Sure thing, Doris. We’ll be right down.” 

_______________________________________

“so, uh, who’s doris?” Sans asks, smiling at you as you hold the door open again (with only the briefest fantasy of ignoring Doris’ request to come down, and instead deciding to hole up in the tower and keep doing what you’d been doing). You smile guiltily, and brush your lips against the top of his head before he climbs down the ladder to the forest floor. You suspect he’s gone down the ladder first strictly in order to sneak a glance at your butt as you climb down after him, which makes you simultaneously roll your eyes and feel privately pleased that after everything you’ve been through together, he’s still going out of his way to check you out.

“My dad’s old secretary. Mom and dad’s main offices were at the research center at base camp so they’d be close to the turbine. Doris and her twin Noreen were always there too. Noreen was my mom’s secretary.” You explain. “Gosh, they have to be like eighty now, they were old as hell when I was just a kid! Oh… I hope Noreen’s okay.” The thought occurs to you and you wince. Sans sidles up next to you, and takes your hand.

“so, she nice?” 

“Like, the nicest.” You confirm quickly. “And her lemon bars, oh my god…” Your stomach growls, and he grins.

“heh, humans make weird noises when they’re hungry. we gotta feed you. but, cool about the secretary. gotta say, i was kinda expecting-”

“Something really awful?” You suggest, and he nods.

“i mean, interrupting _that_ should be against every single law.” He says vehemently, his expression glazing over as he recalls the events of a few minutes ago. You nod quickly, agreeing wholeheartedly. “so it was pretty awful, but not like… i dunno, my dad or something.” You arch an eyebrow at him. 

“You think Gaster would have called us... on the telephone?” You say skeptically, and he laughs again. 

“heh, yeah, i know. maybe not. not theatrical enough for him, anyway. i think i’ve just been having a really shit day up until like five minutes ago.” He admits. “got me all paranoid. should we walk down, or do you wanna take a shortcut?” 

“Oh, can we walk, please? It’s a nice day outside, and starting tomorrow I’ll have to be indoors for almost the entire day, so…” 

“good. hoping you’d say that.” He says, giving you a terribly sweet smile. You sigh, your heart fluttering again, and lean down to kiss him, rubbing the bones at the base of his neck as you do so. He groans quietly and leans up against you, holding you as he kisses you, slow and unhurried. “thank you.” He murmurs, when you pull away. “for giving me so much. your soul is so…” He trails off after a moment, clearly unable to come up with a big enough word.

“I’d be lying if I acted like it was a tough decision to make.” You admit, sliding away and twining your fingers back through his as you begin to walk the easy, sloping path down to the base of the mountain. “Even if it didn’t feel amazing - and it did, oh my god- I hated seeing your soul so… dull. When you started telling me the reasons why you were feeling so awful, and how much had to do with me, I just needed you to know that your existence in my life is a pretty spectacular net positive.”

“yeah. and i do know that, most of the time.” He smiles at you again, and then says, “sometimes though… uh, just so you know… uh… ugh.” He clears his throat and tries again. “that’s a thing that happens to me. sometimes, i get stuck in a pretty bad ...feedback loop and it’s hard for me to shake the feeling that things are terrible. i can even know that i’m wrong about it, and sometimes i still can’t shake that feeling. sometimes, in the underground, it would last for months. it’s something i try to work on, but -” He’s dancing around the word ‘depression,’ maybe out of fear that if he says it, you’ll be frightened or judgmental, but you understand what he’s saying. 

“I know. Sans, you know I’ve been there, right? God, before you guys showed up, before I met Undyne and then you, I was in a pretty damn dark place too.”

“i know. i saw.” Sans mutters, squeezing your hand.

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of. I just want to help you, if I can, when things get bad. And like… I know that it’s not always going to be as easy as today. I know that when things are that dark… look, I don’t expect that me plopping my soul in your hand is gonna cure depression, or even make things any better at all, every time, you know?”

“hey, don’t say it like that. your soul isn’t something that you can just, uh, plop.” He corrects, looking at you. “your soul is the most beautiful thing i have ever seen.” He says it so matter-of-factly, so obviously earnest that you have to fall still for a second, halting in the middle of the broad, paved trail, to process that. That is, after all, a pretty huge statement.

“But… the sun. The stars. The horizon.” You say quickly, and he shakes his head. 

“your soul.” He repeats gently, smiling just a little at you, and you feel yourself flush from your scalp all the way down to your toes as you process this. “it was a beautiful soul even before i knew you.” He explains quietly, gazing through you as he speaks - you know what he’s looking at, of course. “but once i got to know you…” The lights in his eyes are unfocused, his voice is reverent, and your heart is thumping again. “i want to wake up next to that soul for the rest of my life.” He murmurs, leaning up to kiss you once more - god, are you ever going to make it down the mountain? Not that you mind in the least, because you’re still just overwhelmed with love for him.

“Rest of your life, huh?” You whisper, when he finally parts from you again, and he seems to suddenly realize the implications of that statement.

“heh. uh, yeah, that’s how it goes in my head.” He explains quietly, and you mull this over, feeling wildly pleased. It’s so easy to be honest with each other right now, a direct side effect to the literal soul baring from earlier. It’s even easy to be honest with yourself, and that honesty includes admitting to yourself that the prospect of a real future with him - the kind with an engagement, a wedding, a lifetime together, maybe even kids (could you have kids together? Had anyone figured that out yet?) - it had slowly but surely become the thing you just assumed would happen. When had that change occurred, that you’d just shrugged and accepted, in spite of all of Undyne's teasing, that you really did belong with him, the way that soulmates did?

“...Mine too.” You finally admit, and he grins, a huge, relieved grin. 

“cool.” He says quietly, and you smile widely at him, looking at his soul again and feeling satisfied by the blazing, ultra-saturated blue beneath his ribs. That’s more like it.

___________________________

It takes you forever to get down the mountain, because you’re rapidly confirming Sans’ hypothesis that an after-effect of soul touching is that both of you have a tendency to be just outrageously, ostentatiously in love with each other afterwards. It feels wonderful, of course, but it is almost certainly something that would drive any outside observer up the wall. You keep stopping to steal kisses, to point out the beautiful views, to admire the wildlife, or to gaze into each other’s eyes. You’re fully aware that you’re being ridiculous, but in the moment, it just feels so beautiful. 

It almost comes as a relief all the same, the first time Sans makes a dry, not at all romantic quip about something, and you both burst out laughing for a little too long. 

“Man, we should be careful with our souls, I think.” You admit, a little later. “As amazing as that feels…”

“i know. we can’t always be that mushy, we’ll lose all our friends.” 

“Right. And since I’m a sponge, apparently, I should avoid the comparison to being mushy. It just sounds unpleasant.” You rib him gently, a grin on your face. 

“figured i was gonna catch hell for comparing my girlfriend to a sponge eventually.” He sighs, grinning, as you make the final curve in the trail down the mountain and the EbbCo research base comes into sight. 

“You couldn’t have gone with ‘paper towel?’”

“how the hell is that any better?!” He snorts, indignant.

“Sponges are gross! They like, hang out on the side of the sink, smelling bad! Paper towels at least aren’t, like, actively gross!” You protest, and he snickers. 

“well, at the time i couldn’t think of anything else that just passively sucked.” 

“You saying I suck?” You drawl, and immediately regret it when both browbones rise at once.

“you show unbelievable skill in that area, yes.” He replies, that shit-eating grin on his face, and you can’t even be mad because, goddamn it, you love him for it too. 

“Mhm. Keep talking, bonehead, compare me to more gross cleaning supplies, and we’ll see if you ever get to experience that talent again.” You drawl, and he immediately, without a seconds’ hesitation, mimes zipping his “lips” and throwing away the key, eyes dancing with barely contained mirth. Oh, it’s nice to get back to normal, you think, snickering as you nudge him with your shoulder. “Okay. Got it all out of your system? We’re finally here.” You say, nodding at the research facility.

It’s a multi-level structure, designed to look halfway between a ski lodge and a very high end office building. Like everything else your parents had any say in the design of, there were many, many windows; your mom and dad always had believed in the value of natural sunlight. The EbbCo logo is set into the polished marble that constitutes the stairway up to the lodge. Sans makes a quiet, impressed noise. “nice digs.” 

“Yeah, when Mom and Dad expanded the company they had a lot of requirements. They didn’t want EbbCo to be a terrible place to work. They’d both had some really bad bosses and employers, I guess. So they wanted a place employees would be happy to come to, and they really focused on quality of work/life stuff, I suppose.” You look up at the building. “God, I used to come here all the time when I was a kid. So weird to be back now.” 

“hey, question. why d’you think they monitor when the research towers get unlocked?” Sans wants to know. You wrinkle your nose, thinking. 

“Beats me. Probably liability reasons, don’t want anyone getting sued. I don’t know why they didn’t just like, sell the towers to the city, though, they’d probably be good for bird watching. No good for anything else without a barrier.” You say, and he nods slowly, then stops at the entrance, about to push the door open for you. 

“you, uh, ready?” He asks, a little strangely, and you blink at him. “i mean, this is the first time we’ve done this. gone out into a human place and told ‘em we’re dating. plus…” He trails off and nods at your arm. You take a deep breath. 

“Hey, gotta do it sooner or later, right?” You reason, trying not to feel nervous, hoping that the skarm doesn’t give Doris a heart attack all the same.

“sure. just, you know, gimme a sign if things don’t go okay and we need to get out of there, right?” He offers, and, seeing the true worry on his face, you nod quickly. He takes a second to gather his wits, you think, then pushes the door open. “oh. okay.” He says, a second later.

The receptionist in the grand lobby has a giant hand for a head. 

“Hello, and welcome to EbbCo!” She says politely. “Where may I direct you two? Do you have an appointment?”

“Oh, um, Doris Aberdeen is expecting us?” You offer, trying not to feel surprised that the receptionist here is a monster. Hell, it’s what your parents would have wanted, right?

“Oh, fantastic. Let me just give her a call, one moment please.” The receptionist says - she has no mouth, but she’s speaking from…. somewhere, because this isn’t just in your head. She picks up a receiver and dials, and after a moment's soft conversation, nods at you and Sans. “All set! Just go up to the eighth floor, and she’ll meet you at the elevator bank.” She says cheerfully. “Have a wonderful day!” 

“Thank you!” You say politely, and Sans tips her a quick wave as you step into an elevator. Once the doors shut, you exchange a look. 

“well, uh, this might go smoother than expected…” The door slides open on the third floor, and a short fire elemental steps in, juggling a mug of coffee and a clipboard. He looks up at Sans and does a double-take. 

“Hey, Sansy! What are you doing here?” Sans clearly recognizes the little guy. 

“heats. hey! here with my girlfriend.” He nods quickly at you, and the elemental looks you over. 

“Hey there. Heats Flamesman’s the name. That’s H-E-A-T-”

“she’s got it buddy.” Sans cuts him off. “so what are you doing here?” The little elemental looks surprised. 

“Didn’tcha hear? EbbCo’s hiring up all sorts of monsters with expertise in the Core! They wanna know how to use geothermic energy, just like we did!”

“...’s that so?” Sans says, still sounding surprised. 

“That’s right! You should apply, Sansy! They pay human money! _Good_ human money. You should apply too, Sans’ girlfriend, even if you’re not a scientist they’re giving monsters support staff jobs, so-”

“Oh! I’m, um… not a monster?” You stammer, surprised. Heats looks at you, then your arm, then laughs. 

“Hah! Figured Sansy would be dating a joker. Okay, well, see you guys around, but you really should apply! Don’t forget!” He steps out of the elevator on the seventh floor, and you meet Sans’ eyes for a brief, confused moment, before the elevator doors slide open once again, to reveal Doris waiting for you on the eighth floor. 

She’s just as you remember - older, of course, but still immaculately dressed, her tiny, trim figure accentuated by a high waisted skirt, and a purple silk top. Her white hair is close cropped to her head, and her makeup is gorgeous, in spite of the challenges that a rather wrinkled face presents. She is absolutely thrilled, her smile wider than you can ever recall seeing it. 

“Ohl It really is you!” She says, studying your face. “Oh, you’ve grown so, so much!” She sighs, then turns to Sans. “And you must be her boyfriend! We all heard our _______ talking about you on the news before Christmas - wonderful interview, ________, we were so proud.” She beams at you again, then looks back at Sans. “We all wondered who the lucky monster was!”

“heh. that would be me. name’s sans, nice to meet you.” Sans says, looking much more relaxed by the unquestionable warmth of Doris’ greeting. She shakes his hand, then turns to hug you, still beaming. You’re smiling too, so surprised that your dad’s secretary remembers you so fondly after all these years, you’ve actually forgotten to be nervous. She’s about to hug you, when she notices your arm at last, and falls still. 

“Oh.. goodness.” She whispers, and takes a step back, fishing in her skirt pocket and pulling out a pair of glasses. She squints at you through them, focusing on your arm, the frown on her face growing deeper and deeper. Suddenly, she glances up and glares at Sans, her expression incredibly severe. “What on earth did you do to her!?” She demands, and Sans stands there, looking shocked and hurt.

“Woah.” You step forward, suddenly feeling quite protective of Sans. “He didn’t do this to me, Doris. Please be polite to my boyfriend.” You say, as clearly as possible. She blinks at you, her eyes artificially magnified through the thick glasses. 

“But… hon, your arm!” She whispers, sounding pained and horrified.

“ _Humans_ did that.” You say clearly, unhappy with the sudden turn of events. “More than fifty of them attacked my parents’ house on Christmas night. One of them tried to shoot me with a gun. I was very lucky that someone present was able to work magic to get me away from the bullet, but it came at a cost. Still, without monsters, that human would have killed me, and I’d have lost a lot more than part of my arm.” You say, worried that this explanation is going to get pretty damn tired in the months to come.

Still, the look on Sans’ face when you spring to his defense… he looks so relieved that you don’t mind having to explain such a personal thing to someone you haven’t seen in more than a decade. She looks skeptical, but when you pointedly thread your skeletal fingers through Sans’, she gets your point.

“Well.” She manages to get the word out. “In that case I’m very happy you were there, Mr. Skeleton.” 

“‘sans’ is fine.” Sans says pointedly, and you grimace at the thick tension in the air. You could cut it with a knife, you think. Maybe she thinks that too, because she mutters;

“I’ll be right back with those lemon bars.” She bustles off in the direction of the kitchen and you and Sans exchange an unhappy glance. 

Okay. Maybe it wouldn’t be perfectly smooth, your future together, because of stuff like this. Then again, since you were planning on sticking together, maybe you’d just end up growing thicker skin, metaphorically.

It seemed like you’d probably get a lot of opportunities to practice.


	63. In Which Things Get Dark In EbbCo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man, new characters are fun.   
> Here's some f-art
> 
> [WREXIE DREW SPOT](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140302791761/wrexie-sketches-from-yesterdays-stream-oh)
> 
> [ SOUL TOUCH ](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140290288571/artanddetermination-oh-boy-look-at-the-time)
> 
> [CUTE READER 1](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140282261441/choccookiemonster-i-was-supposed-to-study-for)
> 
> [ CUTE READER 2](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140282199421/colorfulexhaustion-ive-been-dragged-to-hell)
> 
> [ A RIDICULOUS COMIC ](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140262094571/fakeivy1412-um-i-cant-remember-what-i-wrote)

When Doris returns, you’ve already threaded the master key off the loop on your keychain. You can turn it in without any regrets because, well, you’ve got copies of it at home - your mom had lost her keys what seemed like every week, and you were still finding backup keys to properties your family no longer owned. Doris has managed to compose herself in her absence, and she clears her throat, before saying, “________, Sans, I am… I’m very sorry for my rudeness earlier. You should know that EbbCo still embraces your parents’ value statement - it’s still on the contract every new employee signs. We’re a non-discriminatory organization, and I made a leap based on… a very wrong assumption. It wasn’t right of me to jump to the conclusion that monsters had caused your arm to be so…” She loses the thread of her apology, staring in horror at your arm again. 

“hey.” His voice is much sharper than you’re accustomed to hearing. “it’s just... different.” Sans corrects Doris slowly, and you can tell he’s not at all happy that she’s still staring at you like there’s something terribly off with you. “nothing wrong with her. arm still works. she’s fine. you don’t have to look at her like she’s in a freakshow or-”

“Babe.” You cut him off. “People aren’t used to it yet, that’s all.” You don’t love the tension in the air, and you get the sense that he’d be spitting mad if you weren’t present. “Thank you, Doris.” You say, after a moment, and pass the key over, placing it flat on her desk where she can see it. “We’d, um, we’d better get out of your hair.” You try, and there’s a flash of clear distress on the elderly woman’s face.

“Oh, please…” She says, then shakes her head. “Oh, I’ve made such a mess of this. Please, forgive an old lady’s foolishness. You have to understand…” She puts the tray of lemon bars down and takes a step forward. “It’s just so good to see you again, but… goodness, I didn’t know until today just how much we’d gotten wrong!” She says, distressed. You blink at her. 

“What do you mean?” You ask quietly, and she shakes her head. 

“You must understand, we thought you blamed us.” She starts quietly, then clears her throat. “Oh, we doted on you when you were small. Such a clever little girl. So patient. So kind.” She sighs, remembering. “You were everyone’s favorite, do you remember that? You had every single person here wrapped around your finger. We all loved when you came into work with your mother and father. You wanted to know how every single thing worked! Goodness, if you had a question, you’d have ten grad students fighting for the chance to show you the answer! And you were never spoiled, never took advantage, you were just the sweetest, most inquisitive girl.” The harsh look on Sans face begins to fade, as Doris finally manages to convey the true affection she clearly still harbors for you. Suddenly, Sans is a very attentive listener - well, of course, this is brand new information about you, and he collects anything new about you the way Papyrus collects action figures. “But then, after the accident… you never came back. We didn’t blame you for not answering any of the cards or the invitations to come visit. It must have been impossible to think of this place without thinking of your parents’ passing…” You blink at that, and Sans looks at you, uncertain.

“Doris, I never got any cards or invitations.” You say, your mouth forming a straight, serious line, as what she’s telling you begins to process. If what she was saying was true, then… Then here was yet another thing that Paula had stolen from you. You’d just assumed that all of the adults from your parents’ work had been so nice to you because you were the bosses’ kid. With your mom and dad out of the picture, why would they care what happened to you? But now, well; “If you saw my interview, you must have heard that I didn’t have the best caretaker, during that time…” Doris hisses through her teeth, standing very upright as her suspicions are confirmed. 

“That witch. We wondered, but we never really thought anyone would be that cruel… She didn’t even give you our cards, though? Nothing for your birthday or Christmas?” You shake your head slowly. 

“If there was a half chance that something addressed to me had money in it, you can bet I never saw it.” You sigh ruefully. “I just figured… you know, what was I going to do, be underfoot? And maybe… it was hard, thinking about this place.” You admit. “I don’t know if I would have come back right away, even if I knew I was welcome.” You say guiltily. Sans squeezes your hand a little tighter, looking around the room, perhaps trying to figure out what a ten year old would have seen in this place. Doris studies you for a moment as well, then reaches behind her back to her desk, grabbing a tissue and dabbing her eyes quickly. 

“We failed you.” She finally sighs. “I knew your mother and father better than I knew many of my own family members. I know that they never would have wanted you to feel like you couldn’t trust us. Back in those days, this company really was a family.”

“It still is.” This is a new voice, coming from one of the offices down a hall. You look up quickly, and again, Sans tenses at your side, but then you recognize the speaker. Anyone in town would recognize him, to be fair, but you’d known Peter Capra before he was the CEO of EbbCo, you’d known him back when he was just a college intern who split his time running errands for your mom, doing field work, and occasionally babysitting you. “Welcome home, ________.” He says, and you can sense Sans doing his very best not to scoff at the grandeur of that statement. It is ridiculous, you suppose, but over the past twelve years, you’ve seen the new CEO hone his flair for the theatrical; the shareholders had loved him for it, even when the collapse of the barrier had threatened to bring down the entire company with it. 

And, well, it’s hard not to like Peter Capra. He’s young - not yet forty. He’s terribly handsome, with jet black hair, gorgeous blue eyes, and a smile that’s probably charmed its fair share of people out of their better judgment. For you, though, he’s just the nerdy guy who’d taught you about Boba Fett when you were a kid, and you’re not particularly surprised at how happy you are to see him now, even if he looks worlds different from the pimply nerd you’d grown up with.

“Petey!” You exclaim, in spite of yourself, then grimace as his smile twitches slightly. “Oh. Man. I am so sorry, you don’t go by Petey anymore, do you… and I’m not eight anymore so I probably shouldn’t be calling grown men ‘Petey’ anyway, that’s kinda weird…” You fumble, and he chuckles, a rich, melodious sound. 

“I generally go by Peter. But I could definitely make the exception for you, we go that far back.” He allows, looking you over, a dazzling smile on his face. “You know, ________, you are exactly the last person I expected to see here today! You look… god, you look amazing! Doris, doesn’t she look amazing?!” He laughs, his expression one of genuine delight. Doris nods patiently, watching her employer, as he analyzes you. His eyes rest on the skeletal hand and wrist sticking out of your coat sleeve for a moment, still tangled with Sans’ fingers. It definitely registers with him, but he doesn’t seem particularly upset, the way Doris had been - if anything, he looks fascinated, but when his confident blue eyes move over to Sans, he’s smart enough to realize that the skeleton probably would not tolerate it if he just demanded to see how your arm worked. 

Abruptly, he seems to realize that he hasn’t greeted the monster at all, in fact. “Oh, lord, I am clearly a little too hungover to be properly polite today, huh?” He strides over, and offers his hand for Sans to shake; Sans reluctantly disengages from your hand to return the gesture - you wonder if he might be gripping the CEO’s hand a little hard, but Peter merely lets out a chuckle and says, “Peter Capra. EbbCo’s my baby now.” Sans’ eyesockets narrow slightly at that. You feel a sting of slight irritation as well, but it’s not enough to actually grumble about, so you stay quiet, observing the interaction. 

“sans.” He offers - an awfully low effort greeting, you notice. “heard of you.” Peter’s eyes widen when Sans says his name, though, and he immediately replies, 

“Oh! I’ve heard of you too. Quite a bit about you, actually.” He releases Sans’ hand, but he’s studying him with much greater regard suddenly. “You worked on the core in the underground, right?” Sans frowns slightly. 

“i worked on lots of stuff.” He hedges, moving his arm around your waist as he talks. You look at him and Peter for a second, then over at Doris, who looks mildly amused at the behavior of the men. Peter and Sans are not at all hiding how obviously they’re sizing each other up.

“A jack-of-all-trades.” Peter says, and Sans shrugs. 

“somethin’ like that.” 

“You know, we could certainly use some more jack-of-all-trades around here.” Peter says, arching an eyebrow. 

“yeah? got a lot of _jacking-of_ to accomplish?” Sans drawls, an eyebrow ridge raised delicately. Peter mulls this over, then lets out a delighted bark of laughter. 

“Very funny. I like this guy!” He announces, as if there’s an audience present to react to this statement. “A little bit more than just jacking.” He finally tells Sans, very lightly. “Ever since the barrier came down, we’ve been forced to go back to unsustainable sources of fuel for our power around here.” He glances at you, then at Sans. Doris sighs and sits down, elderly bones moving slowly - she’s clearly heard this story before. “They told me to get out of the business, sell the assets, start fresh with something new. But I knew that our best assets were the minds that were stuck underground this whole time. You guys have been doing stuff differently for millennia - it’s about time our races worked together to solve the world's problems, since we’re gonna be sharing it now.” He says, the passion behind that belief clear in his voice. Sans mulls this over. 

“hm. can’t argue with that.” He declares, and Peter smiles slowly, quite pleased. 

“Well, I do hope you’ll consider coming aboard the team here.” He proposes, looking somewhat greedily at Sans - you’re long forgotten, all of a sudden. “We could really use someone with your skillset, if what I’ve heard from the fire elementals and Knight-Knights is true.” 

“hm? what skillset is that?” Sans says, looking quite curious. 

“Fixing stuff.” Peter says, then looks back over at you. “Which you’re clearly a success at, if you’ve gotten _______ to come back and see us.”

“she did that all on her own.” Sans points out, and you clear your throat.

“Technically, I was breaking and entering.” You say, trying not to grin too obnoxiously. He stares at you, then groans. 

“The alarm from the old observation tower this morning. You still had a key, didn’t you?” He says quietly. “God, that teaches me a lesson. Security’s always weakest-”

“From the inside.” You agree. “Yeah, we learned that one too, recently.” 

“I’m sure you did.” He says, his eyes resting on your arm again, brimming with curiosity. “________, I don’t suppose you’d like to go to lunch sometime and catch up. As old pals.” He establishes quickly, when Sans makes a quiet noise that manages to convey a world of disapproval for this man asking you out in front of him. “I was your babysitter, for fuck’s sake, there’s a line I wouldn’t cross, no matter what.” He laughs, after a moment, when he sees the two of you mulling it over. 

“Sure. As pals.” You finally agree. “Sans, would you like to come too?”

“you know, i would?” Sans says innocently, and Peter chuckles again, holding his hands up in acquiescence for his inability to crack a unified front. 

“Well. Nobody will be able to argue that you two don’t belong together if you keep that shit up.” He says fondly, running a hand through his glossy black hair. 

“Are people saying that?” You ask, and he scoffs. 

“Naturally. The second there were pictures of you in the press.” He glances around. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the world outside of EbbCo isn’t so big on integration. Which brings me back to my earlier point. Sans. My card.” He reaches into his pocket, and produces a white card with a telephone number on it. He’s about to hand the card to Sans, then he squints his eyes at the monster, clicks his tongue, then turns the card over, producing a pen and scrawling a number on the back. “Let’s start with that, for salary negotiations.” He says lightly, passing the card over. The light of Sans’ eyes flares slightly. 

“‘s a lot of zeroes, buddy.” He points out, and Peter grins. 

“You’d be working hard. This isn’t filling out paperwork. This is figuring out how to apply monster discoveries on a global scale, for the good of all sentient beings.” 

“which you’d get a cut of.” 

“ _We’d_ get a cut of.” Peter snorts. “Nobody works for free, bud. But this is your chance to turn a profit and make a real difference for the next generation. Think it over. Give me a call tomorrow. Oh, Doris, go on and give _______ her key back.” Doris has remained silent for all this, but she sits upright again, looking slightly indignant at the request. 

“But, Mr. Capra, the security measures-”

“It’s ________. She’s earned the right. This was all supposed to be her birthright, anyway.” He says blithely, and claps your shoulder. “You, give me a call about that lunch. Or dinner. Drinks? I’m not picky.” He demands. “And make your boyfriend see that he’s got an amazing opportunity in front of him right now. I know, I know.” He laughs, when you open your mouth. “I can see you’re a team. No playing you guys off each other. You’re a lucky monster,” He tells Sans, “she’s always been a remarkable person. Only kid I could ever stand.” 

“oh, i know it.” Sans says warily, while you try not to flush under that brilliant gaze. 

“Like I said. Think on it.” He scoops up the key off Doris’ desk, and presses it back in your hand - deliberately offering it to the hand that was all human, you think. “And like I said, ________. Welcome home.” He says, pressing a button on the wall that seems to be for an elevator just for him. It opens instantly, and he tips a wave at the three of you, before stepping inside and letting the doors close behind him. Once the sound of the mechanism has faded, Sans begins chuckling, and Doris looks carefully between the two of you, as you begin to snicker as well. 

“He must have rehearsed that exit a thousand times.” You sigh.

“if i started working here, he’d have me making him an iron man suit before the day was up.” Sans points out, and you clap your hands together. 

“Oh, that’s what he’s going for, Tony Stark!” You say, and beam at Sans. “Great call, babe!” 

“Yes, well. He is a wonderful employer. I was going to leave, when your parents passed, ______. But Peter… He’s focused on building a better world.” Doris says admiringly. “I believe in him. And if he believes in you, young man, I urge you to take the position.” She says, so stridently that Sans is forced to stop smirking and give her a gentle smile. 

“i really will think about it.” He assures the elderly woman. “anyway, we’d better get out of your hair. i think we need to get _______ some food, anyway.” 

“Oh! The lemon bars!” Doris exclaims. 

___________________________

Half an hour later, you’re stepping back through to the kitchen, each laden down with a metal baking pan filled with lemon bars. You have to admit, this is a clever plan of Doris’ - you’re going to need to come back just to return the pans. 

The kitchen is deserted, at least, in a mild state of disarray. The sound of a heated game of Monopoly is coming from the other room, preventing either of you from worrying too much - except, of course, for the poor souls who were playing caffeinated Papyrus at Monopoly. 

“Well.” You start, and he snorts.

“that was the weirdest, uh… interview?”

“Reunion?” You offer. 

“...date? was that a date?” He laughs, and you smile, leaning up against him; here was another consequence of soul touching, you’d noticed that you were both unhappy to let more than a few centimeters of space in between you right now. 

“If it was, it was a bad date on my behalf.” You admit, and he snickers. 

“eh. i had fun.” He says, wrapping an arm lazily around your waist. “kinda. god, that capra is a…” He trails off, then looks up at you. “babe, i think i’m gonna take the job.”

“You’re kidding me.” You’re genuinely surprised. 

“nah. i don’t know about that guy, but i know this much - he went from a nobody to a multi-millionaire after your mom and dad died, and that means i wanna check him out a little more.” He says. You nod, thinking on that. 

“You’ll be careful, though?” 

“i always am.” 

“Like hell you are.” You snort, leaning over to kiss him softly. He snickers when you part from him, and shakes his head. 

“fine. i’ll be careful. and you should be careful too. i don’t think that guy just wants a lunch from you.” 

“Yeah, he wants to check out the skarm.” You say, grabbing a lemon bar with the skarm in question. Sans rolls his eyes. 

“he seemed like he’d check out whatever he could.” He drawls. “i don’t buy that babysitting shit for a second, he thinks you’re hot.” 

“Well, I am hot.” You say, smirking at him, and he rolls his eyes. You sigh after a moment. “You have nothing to worry about. I’m not gonna meet him without you there.” You reassure him. “You’d better tell Asgore, if you’re quitting, though.” 

“oh, i’m not quitting.” Sans says with a lazy shrug, and you stare at him for a second before groaning. 

“Oh my god.” 

“what?” He’s all injured innocence. 

“You’re _so_ excited about playing spy, aren’t you?”

“asgore needs to know what’s up.” He protests weakly, a half smile on his face. 

“Mhm.” You say, nudging him with your shoulder, and you finally take a bite of the lemon bar Doris has made. It’s delicious, but… well, in spite of the good mood, the good food, the relatively non traumatizing afternoon, you’re still just a little nervous. “You’ll be safe?” You check with him again, and he opens his mouth to tease you, then seems to understand the sincerity of the question. 

“yeah. i promise.” He says sincerely, and you hope against hope that it’ll be enough.


	64. In Which You're Not At All A Hero

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so thrilled that you guys like Capra holy cow.  
> I am thrilled by you guys in general, but I like that you're fully on board with Capra.   
> Here's some f.art.  
> I'm just gonna use the artist's comment here:  
> [Who's ready to get fucked up by this handsome bitch?](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140377176551/mod2amaryllis-totalskeletontrash-is-mean-she)

A pathetic groan of protest from the other room catches your attention, and you turn to Sans. “Babe, I gotta go in there.”

“hm?” Sans is eying a lemon bar dubiously. You snicker, and break off a small piece for him to taste. 

“It sounds like your brother is like, causing mental harm to Lawyerpants.” You explain quietly. Sans considers that for a second. “He did have four cups of coffee. That we know about.”

“oof. yeah. go.” He agrees, and chews thoughtfully on the lemon bar. “oh, bad news.” He sounds just pleased enough with himself that you know to brace yourself. 

“What?” You look at him suspiciously. 

“you and me are done. yeah. i’m marrying that old lady so she can keep making me these lemon things, see ya-” He says, an obnoxious grin on his face, and he laughs when you roll your eyes and turn away. “i’ll be in there in like two minutes, just gotta call tony stark.”

“When did you even see Iron Man?” You wonder.

“there’s a _movie?!_ ” He sputters, giving you a fully unattractive view of half chewed lemon bar. 

“A. Gross. B. Yeah, you comic book nerd. We’ll watch it some time, it’s really good. The first one, anyway.” You laugh, grab a glass of orange juice from the table (still weighed down from all the brunch Papyrus had cooked) and go in to rescue Lawyerpants. 

\--------------------------

It’s worse than you’d imagined. Monster Kid and Frisk are on a team. Undyne and Alphys are on a hungover team. Asgore and Toriel are on a exceedingly mushy team. Which leaves… Lawyerpants and Papyrus on the worst team ever. And, of course, Mettaton, draped over the couch and sighing with fits of dramatic ennui, is teamless, tragic, and making heart eyes at the fully miserable cat, who doesn’t seem to appreciate anything that’s happening. 

You can’t tell what’s the worst for him; the proximity to the screaming skeleton, the pounding headache that the cat surely has, the mere presence of Mettaton, the indignity that Ghost has climbed up on his lap and is purring - which has to be pretty damn weird, the equivalent of a tiny, unintelligent, naked, elderly man sitting on you, you suppose - and worse, shedding on that Armani suit… or the fact that Lawyerpants doesn’t want to look bad in front of his client (and his king), and so he clearly doesn’t feel like he can express his displeasure at any of this. 

You probably should not be tempted to laugh right now, you think, looking at the board. It looks like Frisk and MK are winning handily, which has Papyrus in a jittery lather. 

“HOW CAN WE STILL BE IN JAIL? WE’RE INNOCENT! WE NEVER HURT ANYONE! I’M GOING TO WRITE THE BROTHERS PARKER TO GET THIS ALL CLEARED UP!” He wails, and Lawyerpants cringes from the volume, his ears flattened flat against his head. You know that reflex from trips to the vet with Ghost (who is looking very irritated that this giant cat isn’t doing an adequate job of petting him right now). 

“Hey, Lawyerpants? Can I talk to you for a second? In private?” You say, doing your best to look awkward (not that it’s particularly hard). Every head in the room swivels to look at you, and Lawyerpants looks bewildered for a second.

“No fair! That makes the teams uneven!” MK complains. 

“Oh, but I really need him for… legal stuff!” You try. You are being fully heroic right now. Not that anyone seems to care. Toriel and Asgore haven’t looked at you yet, they’re busy staring at each other - oh, god, was that what you and Sans were like? If so, you need to stop, like, immediately, because that was just the worst-

“Hey! Hey _______! Did you try some of this bloody mary stuff yet?!” Undyne exclaims, and you see she’s got most of a pitcher in front of her still. Behind her, Alphys nods very quickly, gesturing that you should please, please remove the drink from Undyne. 

“Oh! No, I didn’t! And Sans really, really wants to try some too!” You say quickly. You aren’t just heroic. You are super heroic. They should make a statue of you. You swoop in and grab the pitcher first, then grab Lawyerpants’ hand, helping him to his feet. Ghost jumps away the second the cat begins to lurch upright. Lawyerpants staggers slightly, then gives you a look of absolutely enormous gratitude as you smile at him, then at the small crowd playing monopoly. Papyrus’s hands are twitching constantly, rattling around a tiny contingent of hotels as he complains, 

“BUT THAT’S MY PARTNER!”

“Pssh, you can win on your own, Paps.” You assure him. “Besides. I need Lawyerpants for really important human stuff, so…”

“VERY WELL, HUMAN, I’LL WIN THIS FOR SKELETON-KIND!” Papyrus insists, and you smile at him before graciously leading Lawyerpants off, stopping when you’re far enough to be out of earshot. 

“Hey, you doing okay?” You ask quietly, and he lets out a soft, tired laugh. 

“You are, very literally, a lifesaver, bud.” He mutters. “I need to get out of that game. I need a safe spot to convince myself that I don’t need to throw up.” He casts a glance at the bloody mary pitcher in your hand and makes a despairing noise. 

“Let me hide this!” You say, trying not to laugh, and duck into another room to put the pitcher down, then return carefully. “Hey. It’s all gone. Lemme take you home.”

“My car’s here.” He says, sounding miserable. 

“Sans or I will drive it home for you, just give us the address.” You promise. He looks staggeringly relieved for a second, then winces, bending over and trying to catch his breath. 

“But… your mean aunt.” 

“If I need you, I’ll come find you.” You assure him. He looks up at you from his hunched over position, and sighs. 

“God, you’re perfect, can I marry you?” 

“I think you’ll have to get in line.” You laugh, then blink. Oh, wow. Okay. Right. That was out there. He doesn’t miss your reaction. 

“You know, you and your boyfriend would make a perfect test case for the legality of human/monster marriage-” He can’t restrain himself, the legal wheels in his mind clearly turning. 

“I’VE BARELY KNOWN HIM A MONTH!” You exclaim (managing not to share that Sans also clearly has intentions of marrying an old lady who makes lemon bars), then shake your head as Lawyerpants gives you a sickly, amused, and obnoxiously _knowing_ look. “C’mon, let’s get you home.” 

He doesn’t dispute that, and you open a door to his apartment complex, once you’ve googled the address and feel confident enough that you know where it is. This is the first time you’ve opened a door somewhere you’ve never been before, and you suspect that Sans would probably prefer to be there with you when you do so, in case something goes wrong, but in the end, it’s not much harder than picturing the place from the street view image, and then making a little cut to make sure that you weren’t opening it anywhere unsafe. It’s just a little ways out of downtown, so you don’t want to open a door onto someone’s head or anything. 

It ends up being fine, and Lawyerpants stumbles through, already fumbling in his pocket for a cigarette. You watch him go, then close the door before any more cold air billows inside. You’ve done a very good deed, you tell yourself. You’ve saved so many kitties that you should consider putting it on your resume. You just need to pray that Paula doesn’t show up now. 

____________________

You return to the kitchen, a glass of bloody mary in one hand, the pitcher in the other. Sans eyes you, a browbone arching, particularly when you pour the rest of the mix down the drain. It’s not that it isn’t delicious, it’s just that you feel like you owe Alphys to keep it out of Undyne’s hands - a drunk, still hungover Undyne is more than anyone could handle. 

“mhm.” Sans is saying. He’s still on the phone, and looks like he’s enjoying himself a great deal. “yeah. like i said. already got a job that i like. so don’t lowball me. you either want me or you don’t. which means you’ll pay what i’m worth or you’ll find another guy who built half the core.” You lean back against the counter, taking a sip of bloody mary and watching him. Oh, this is kind of … fun. You have to admit, you enjoy watching him argue. He’s so stubborn when he wants to be, and you’re not sure when you reached the point where you found that hot, but right now, you could watch this for ages. “mmm, how about a month’s paid vacation and we talk about the benefits ______ should have received?” Sans purrs. You bite your lip. You like that tone. “yeah. i know, her aunt got ‘em, but a company like yours shoulda checked it out. the way i see it, my girl’s been shorthanded this whole time because ebbco’s been lazy.” Sans says, winking at you. You try to restrain a laugh, and he falls silent, waiting for the counteroffer. It takes a while, but when the voice starts up on the other side, Sans laughs, holding up a hand,

“deal, deal. don’t make me feel like a charity case, capra.” He laughs, and looks at you. “yeah. yeah, i’ll remind her you want to meet up. with _us_.” He says dryly, holding his hand out for a sip of the bloody mary. You pass it over with a shrug, and hop up on the counter, watching him conclude the deal. “k, k. i’ll be there tomorrow. bright and early.” He says dryly. “catch ya later, boss.” Capra says something on the other end that makes Sans grin, then quickly catch himself. Ending the call, he looks up at you. 

“Well?”

“well, capra’s willing to pay a suspicious amount to have me on the team.” Sans drawls. You shrug. 

“He knows a lot of monsters. He could just have heard how good you are.” You reason, and he nods slowly. 

“it’s a possibility.” He allows. “he’s very excited though.” 

“And you’re not?” You tease gently. “You get to play with science at work again. And you get to spy. Hey, hey Sans. Sans. ‘Spy-ence.’” He gives you a disapproving look. 

“‘s not even a pun, you just put two words together.” He complains, and you roll your eyes at him again, totally unsuccessful at hiding your grin. “how’d your rescue mission go?” He asks, hopping up on the counter next to you. 

“Sent him home. I gotta drive his car there later-”

“i’ll take it, i can move cars.” He says with a crooked smile. He’s still much better than you when it comes to shortcuts, and you know he’s showing off a little. 

“Sure, one chore I don’t have to do.” You reply with a smirk, knowing that the second that this task is labeled a chore, it won’t seem half as fun to him. He pauses, sighs defeatedly, then motions for you to continue. Leaning your head on his shoulder, you say, “I think they’re almost done with Monopoly. It seems like it’s a ...rough game. Once they’re done, I want to play outside with Frisk and Spot until Frisk has to go home. Wanna join, or would you rather-”

“i’ll play.” He says quickly, and you glance at him, removing your head from his shoulder. He shrugs. “i got real used to having you around. it just occurred to me that we go back to the, uh, real world tomorrow.” You hesitate, then nod. Yeah, you’d gotten used to having him around too. “i’m… nah. nah, you’ll be fine.” He says quietly, more or less to himself, but you can hear the concern in his voice. He’s anxious about something, but before you can get him to spill, the Monopoly victors come tearing in, eyes wide with excitement. Papyrus comes clattering after them, followed by a dreamy looking Asgore and Toriel, then a slightly more cheerful Mettaton, now that Lawyerpants isn’t there to moon over. Undyne and Alphys drag themselves in last. “hey, asgore. got something to talk to you about.” Sans says, hopping down from the counter, and you turn to Frisk and MK as Sans leads the king off to share his plan. 

“You guys wanna help me take Spot for a walk?” 

They most assuredly do. 

\--------------------------------------

The rest of the day passes too fast, but it’s one of the best you can remember. Spot is rapturous to finally get the attention she’d been missing out on - she’s glued to your side, and is learning her manners well enough that she only lets out a mildly cranky grumble when Sans returns with Asgore, and immediately heads over to steal a kiss from you. Frisk is decidedly more cranky, but Toriel lectures them that it isn’t gross that Uncle Sans and _______ love each other very much - which is very kind, but probably a little self-serving, if Asgore’s back in the picture. 

Lesser Dog shows up, and the kids, LD, Asgore and Papyrus all begin to collaborate on a snow fort in the back yard. Undyne, finally emerging from her hangover, has a better idea, and begins gathering wood to set up a giant bonfire on the beach, with Alphys acting as supervisor and Mettaton occasionally making suggestions from his spot, on a towel in the sun. He’s set up a solar charging panel next to him, and is acting exactly like he’s trying to catch a tan, which is very hard not to giggle at. Sans argues the logistics behind the bonfire structure for a while, then gives up, making himself a recliner out of snow and taking a nap in the sunshine. You and Spot help Undyne collect driftwood, taking breaks to titter with Toriel, who’s doing her best to pretend that nothing significant has happened between her and Asgore - but come on, it’s _obvious_. Finally, the sun begins to sink, and Undyne ignites the bonfire. In spite of Sans’ doubts, it lights up immediately, and everyone clusters around to ring in the new year by watching the sun disappear over the horizon, warmed by the huge fire.

“well, she does know how to burn stuff.” Sans concedes, grinning as a sleepy looking Papyrus wanders back down from the house with tofu dogs, buns, and long sticks to roast them over the fire. It takes him a while to pass them out; the caffeine has finally worn off, and Paps is exhausted. Frisk has been showing off for MK all day, too busy (and cooooool) to spend much time with you, but they climb onto your lap to eat their hot dog, using Spot’s snout as an armrest. 

You enjoy the moment, feeling so thankful that Paula hadn’t followed through on her threat, and look around at your friends and family, illuminated by the fire, trying to think about what this day would have been like if you’d never met Undyne, never been allowed into this tight circle. Then Sans, on your other side, drowsily leans against you, wrapping his arm around your back, and you decide there’s no point in wondering about other timelines. You’re firmly in this one, and you can’t imagine a better place to be.


	65. In Which Everyone Achieves A Really Normal Work-Life Balance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY I AM BACK AGAIN DID U MISS ME AGAIN  
> HERE, the f.art:  
> [SKARM](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140667379911/thats-probably-the-worse-colors-to-put-together)  
> [hilarious crossover event skarm](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140665326516/mirapancake-here-be-some-fanart-sketchies-of-my)  
> [wonder woman skarm](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140648906856/miss-markers-totalskeletontrash-i-didnt-have)  
> [sketch skarm](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140613814716/submitted-by-meiffin-skarm-doodle-i-might-color)  
> [formal skarm](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140551670266/colorfulexhaustion-this-was-just-supposed-to-be)  
> [metal skarm](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140546192796/submitted-by-trash-master-2000-finished-metal)  
> [Spyence](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140465081781/dipdoppinetree-dipdoppinetree-detective)  
> [VIDEO GAME SPYENCE](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140465118411/sans-the-spy)
> 
>  
> 
> ok I love u bye

The alarm goes off at five-goddamn-forty-five in the morning.

“Noooooo.” You tell your pillow, flailing around for the off button.

“make it stop.” He sounds more distressed than you are. 

“Trying!” You insist, and finally find the switch, sighing in relief when the shrill beeping stops. Sans lets out a soft grumble, pulling you closer, and you glance at the clock and acquiesce, letting him wrap his arm around you and nuzzle your neck. You can stay here for five more minutes, right? Sighing softly, you allow yourself to relax against him, trying not to close your eyes. There’s a back up alarm, but you’d rather avoid it if possible. 

“you sure you gotta go to work?” Sans groans. “we could just sleep. forever.”

“Mhm. I miss my babies.” You yawn, trying not to get too comfortable. It’s impossible. His heavy arm over your waist is so reassuring. How is he so heavy, for a guy who’s just bones?

“they’re birds.” He points out sarcastically, but you can hear the affection in his voice. 

“Still miss ‘em.” You sigh, forcing your eyes to stay open. He chuckles softly, and then pulls you a little closer, so you can feel each individual rib against your back. You know that move by now; he does that when he’s worried. You wait for a second, and aren’t surprised when he speaks up again. 

“...you sure you’re gonna be good?” He checks quietly, and runs his fingers down the inside of your radius. You shudder, suppressing a groan - which is probably just as well, since you think he’s suppressing a laugh at your reaction, himself. 

“I’m s-still getting used to having bones. Um. N-not having bones. I had those. Having bones out. You know. Out bones. Fuck, it’s early.” You attempt to rationalize, and he snickers, then says, 

“well, yeah, kinda my point.” He traces the spot where your radius and ulna meet the fine bones of your wrist, and you actually do groan, this time. 

“You’re being very distracting, you know.” You point out, and you can sense, rather than see, his smile, but as your eyes adjust to the dark the mood grows more solemn. 

“i’m just sayin’. before, people only knew you were on our team when they saw you out with us. but now… they’re probably not all gonna be nice. they’ll be scared. or worse.” He warns softly, the seriousness creeping back into his voice. “heats thought you were a monster yesterday. i don’t think he’s gonna be the only one. people are afraid of what they can’t figure out, and - “ He stops toying with the little bones of your wrist to lean over you, looking seriously at you. “i don’t think there’s a human or monster alive that _can_ figure you out right now, babe. you’re somethin’ new. and you saw that lemon bar lady yesterday-”

“Doris.” You supply, blinking sleepily up at him. 

“doris. she got mad, when she saw you. not at you, at me, but she still got mad. and she loved you. so… i’m just sayin’, be careful, okay? most of us have been doing this for a whole year already, but you…” You sigh, nod, and wriggle out from under him, climbing out of bed. 

“I’ll be careful.” You assure him, stretching slowly. He breathes in through his teeth, then shakes his head.

“i know you can look out for yourself. i’m just sayin’... there’s gonna be a lot. not people who’ll try to hurt you, you know, physically... necessarily.” He says, sitting up in bed. “but the things people say… it wears down on you, babe.” He says gently, speaking from a wealth of experience that you just don’t want to hear right now.

“I’ll be okay.” You whisper, and he looks seriously up at you.

“just… you wanna wear a glove or something, nobody’s gonna think any less of you. you know that, right? you never signed up for any of this.” He says, and you frown. 

“Neither did you guys.” You point out. “You can’t just put on a glove and avoid the shit you get from humans. It’s not fair for me to be able to-”

“hey. if we could, some of us would.” He says, a little sharply, his eyes bright points in the darkness. 

“Yeah? Would you?” You ask, quietly but pointedly. He grunts. 

“‘s not about me.” He says, after a long pause, which is all the answer you need. 

“Look.” You sigh. “You’re worried. I get that. I’m worried too. But this is my life from now on, okay? I’m not just gonna wear a glove every time I go out. It’s not who I am. This is me now, it’s not going to change, and I don’t feel like hiding for the rest of my life. ” You say, then shake your head. “And it’s not fair that I can hide and you or Papyrus or Alphys or Undyne can’t.” You finally say, when he’s quiet for too long, still staring up at you. “I’m gonna do this. I’m gonna do this, and I know it’s probably gonna suck. Like… I know I don’t know yet, how bad it’s gonna be, but I’ve seen how a lot of humans act around you. I’m not expecting any better treatment. But…I don’t want to hide.” You whisper, and he looks solemnly up at you. 

“people like you… the world’ll try to chew you up and eat you whole.” He says, reminding you inexorably of how he’d acted just before he’d kissed you the first time; like he knew, or thought he knew, that he was going to cause you harm just because he was a monster. 

“It’s tried. No luck so far.” You say dryly, and lean down to kiss him after a second, when he’s still looking at you, that worried expression becoming clearer in the dim light. He seems almost resistant for a moment - your lips hit bone and teeth, not the usual sensation of lips that aren’t quite there - but then he acquiesces, and leans up to kiss you properly, before murmuring,

“you’re sure you can’t just come back to bed?” You smile, and shake your head, turning to head for the bathroom. 

“Wish I could. Gotta shower and get going though. Undyne will freak if I’m late. We’re carpooling.” He grumbles quietly, pulling the blankets up around his shoulders. “Hey, tell me how it goes with Petey- uh, with Capra, today.” You say, and he snickers reflexively. “Hey. Hey.” You move closer, trying to grab his attention. Well, it’s easier to do so when you’re wearing what you’re wearing now - which is to say, nothing - and you’re more than willing to use that to your advantage. He blinks up at you, all innocent and sleepy-eyed, but the lights of his eyes are sharp and bright still. “You be good today. Don’t do anything… ugh, just, don’t pull his tail more than you have to, okay?”

“humans don’t have tails.”

“Figure of speech.” You interject quickly. “Seriously. If he’s legit, he’s one of the very few humans around here hiring monsters, okay? Just… play nice.” He sighs, then nods reluctantly. 

“‘m always nice.” He grumbles into the pillow, which is patently not true. When you raise an eyebrow, he snickers again, and then, with a groan, pushes himself out of bed. “mph. ‘s disgusting that i’m up this early.” He grumbles, rubbing his eyesocket with the back of his hand. 

“Go back to sleep! You don’t have to be at EbbCo until nine, right? You should sleep. Go in fresh.” You urge, and he grins.

“eh. shower with you sounds more fun.” He says, a mischievous tone to his voice, leading the way into the bathroom. You can’t exactly argue with that, you suppose. 

\----------------------------------------

That morning before you leave for work becomes something of a talisman for the next two weeks, a shining reminder that things don’t always suck. And they don’t always suck, they genuinely don’t!

...but you have to admit, the suck/non-suck balance is totally thrown off right now. 

The first day back to work hadn’t been… terrible. It had been un-terrible enough that you’d been cautiously optimistic. Sure, you’d gotten a ton of stares, from both your coworkers and the patrons of the aquarium. Walking into the locker room with Undyne hadn’t been so bad - Undyne garnered enough attention on her own that nobody had noticed a skeletal hand peeking out of your sleeve. But then, when you changed from your hoodie into the uniform polo shirt, one of the other girls had barked out a sharp curse, jumping back, and then given you an absolutely mortified look, her unease cutting through her embarrassment as she muttered, 

“Uh. Sorry. Um. You okay?” You nodded reflexively, the smile falling from your face, and you wished, for a split second, that you were a diver, glancing covetously at the long sleeves of another woman pulling her wetsuit on. The girl who’d cursed wasn’t the only one staring anymore. Just about everyone in the locker room was. 

“Hey. Quit perving on ________!” Undyne had snapped, and everyone had glanced away quickly, but the tone was pretty well set for the day. At least the penguins hadn’t cared about your arm at all; you doubted their little pea brains had even noticed. The visitors, on the other hand, they definitely were gawking. You’d never seen such a big crowd at the penguin exhibit before, even when Undyne had first started working. But, generally, people were polite, quiet, just… interested, it seemed. 

You had no idea what was in store for you. 

By the next morning, it was evident that the news had spread, because there were people lined up outside the aquarium at opening to look at you, craning their necks, while the now familiar bursts of light from photographers’ cameras filled your eyes. Undyne grimaced and hustled you inside, but she couldn’t stop you from hearing the awful things that some people were yelling. 

You hadn’t wanted to make a fuss, of course, but when Undyne announced pointedly that if you didn’t tell Sans, she would, you had to bite the bullet and text him. He had been… upset, was one way to put it. He had every right to be upset, in the end - most of the really, _really_ awful stuff people had said had been about him. Well, him and you. Well, mostly that this was what you deserved for dating a skeleton: That was one thing that it seemed every person who yelled at you had immediately assumed, that your arm had become the way it was out of some sort of perversion, or that your skeleton boyfriend had done it to you on purpose to satisfy his own needs. 

Sans had warned you that people might attack you, thinking that you were a monster, but this was different. The malice was more pointed, because people knew that you _weren’t_ a monster, and now those that were looking for it had proof, solid _...bony_ proof that when humans consorted with monsters, bad shit happened. 

You hadn’t really expected it to hurt so much. You’d never figured that words would chip away at you like that. And it wasn’t that any one comment on its own _did_ hurt that badly. It was the… intent, maybe, or the amount. The … the deliberation behind the acts of those people who went out of their way to find you and mock you, or even to find you just to stare. It did hurt. All those little aggressions throughout the next week or so, the laughing innuendo from perfect strangers, the disgusted looks, the way that perfectly normal people would suddenly recognize you from the news, or a tabloid maybe, and snap that you were going to hell, or worse, for… what? For surviving an assassination attempt? For looking just a tiny bit different from other humans?

Still. Still. It wasn’t that bad. You kept telling yourself that, as the days stretched into weeks. On the upside, there’d still been no attacks since Christmas, physical ones on the house, anyway. There’d been bad news - some human teens had been caught chasing a fleet footed rabbit monster, knives drawn. Still. It seemed like there was largely still a lull in violence, perhaps because so many of your attackers were still in jail while the DA tried to figure out what she could do to them. 

Besides. You still had your friends, your boyfriend, right? The mood in the house since you’d texted Sans had been… _strained_. Undyne, Alphys, Papyrus and Lesser Dog were almost smothering in their enthusiasm to be around you, to show you that you were still loved. Every night, there was a new, more dazzling activity than the last - monster board games, a treasure hunt, sparring lessons, a particularly brutal “murder mystery dinner” hosted by Mettaton… The smiles on everyone’s faces seemed awfully forced, though, even Papyrus’, and you wouldn’t have believed that Paps could fake enthusiasm before witnessing it with your own eyes. 

Sans, on the other hand, was more than a little morose. His smile was fakest of all, each night, when he came home from EbbCo. He’d search you out immediately, do a quick look over to make sure you weren’t physically injured, then slump, a few seconds of relief followed by overwhelming weariness. While everyone else was engaging in the night’s planned, super fun activity to get ________’s mind off it, Sans would hover on the periphery, his face buried in his phone. Whenever you asked what he was up to, he’d shake his head, looking guilty, tell you it was nothing, and slap on an even more insincere smile. 

Late one night, after almost two weeks had passed since New Year’s, you managed to get the drop on him, walking up behind him as he scrolled through something, the blue light of the phone reflecting on his skull. Wrapping your arms around his waist, he’d jumped, the phone had clattered to the floor, and you’d seen an image of yourself, looking tired and harassed, leaving the aquarium, filling the screen. Leaning down, you’d picked up the phone, bewildered, and handed it tentatively back to him. He’d gone tense, but seeing all the questions in your gaze, he’d sighed through his teeth, and nodded at the phone. 

“scroll down.” He’d muttered, and you’d understood almost immediately. 

You shouldn’t have been surprised that there were already forums devoted to saying sick shit about you on the internet. It was the internet, after all! Still.

Yeah. It sucked. 

“You can’t just get yourself angry reading that shit all day.” You’d finally muttered, passing the phone back. “Stop it, baby. You can’t stop them from saying what they want.”

“i know.” He’d sighed, looked up at you, groaned, and then hugged you tight. He’d been doing an awful lot of that, too; the horny skeleton routine had been replaced overnight by a clinging boyfriend instead - you woke up most mornings so thoroughly tangled in his hold that you had to wake him to extricate yourself. He was worried, that much was clear. You didn’t think he was sleeping much. He definitely wasn’t eating much. You’d worried that he’d lose it, that he might do something brave and stupid, but in the end... 

Well, you’re the one who ends up snapping. 

On January fifteenth, Barb, your boss, calls you into her office, and sits you down. She hasn’t seen much of you since you returned from vacation, not more than a few moments in passing in the halls. There’s not really a need for her to talk to you when things are running smoothly; she knows how competent you are at your job and she generally lets you be. The news about your arm has obviously reached her first, based on her behavior when you bump into her, but aside from a darting glance at your arm, she hasn’t reacted one way or the other to the increased publicity from your _condition,_ as some of your coworkers were euphemistically calling it. God, you’d thought there was nothing more ridiculous than ‘skarm’ to call your arm, but you’d been clearly mistaken. 

“Look. I’m not here to bullshit.” She says, looking up from her computer, her steely gaze fixing on you. “You know I answer to the Board of Directors, and the Board answers to the donors, and the donors keep the aquarium afloat. So to speak.” You don’t think she intended the pun. “Sometimes, the board wants something awful, and there’s nothing I can do about it, if they determine it’s for the good of the aquarium as a whole, okay?” 

You’ve got a sinking feeling in your stomach. “Okay.” You say quietly, looking at your knees. She stares at you for a second, then swallows. 

“This is just temporary.” She says.

“Oh.” You can barely do more than a whisper, blood pounding in your eardrums in time with your heartbeat. This is all your nightmares from the past few years coming true. You’re losing it. You’re losing a thing you loved. 

“You’re not fired.” She adds quickly. “We just need to find some stuff for you to do… you know. Out of the public view. For now.” She says, and you blink. 

“You mean like…”

“There’s paperwork you could do from home.” She offers weakly. 

“From home.” You repeat. “I can’t even come in.”

“__________.” You understand, for the first time, how miserable Barb is to have to tell you this, when you hear her voice catch. “It’s just until things blow over-”

“They’re not going to blow over!” You finally exclaim, looking up from your knees. “You know that! I’m a goddamn freak, and people want to pay to see the freak, and that’s how things are always going to go!”

“__________-”

“No!” You stand up, breathing hard. “Fuck! God, I’m sorry, but… fuck! This was it! This was the thing I was good at! This is what I wanted to be! I wanted to be _you!_ ” You say, wiping your eyes with the back of your flesh-and-blood arm. “I… you know what, I don’t deserve this, I was a model employee, I did all the awful jobs nobody else wanted to do, and I did them with a smile. I stayed late - you didn’t have to ask me, I stayed late, I came in early, because I cared. Because I genuinely love this place. And I had to work so hard for every single step! I had to take all those college courses online, and you made me _prove_ to you that they weren’t garbage, and that I wasn’t garbage, because I couldn’t afford to go to real college and not work here and you knew it, you knew it!” Barb is silent, staring up at you. You should probably stop. You’ve never spoken out of turn like this to anyone, ever.

But you’re on a roll. “You’re gonna hide me away because I got attacked. By humans, by the way, thanks for the phone call asking if I was okay when fifty humans attacked my goddamn house. Yeah, I got shot at, and because I was lucky enough to know monsters, this is all I lost, not my life, just my arm, and it’s _embarrassing_ to you, I suppose, so the solution is to hide me away and keep giving me a paycheck so I won’t, what, sue?” You say, holding out your hand so she’s forced to look at it, trying not to bawl, trying to remain at least a little coherent. That last comment, about suing, it gets her - she cringes, and you know immediately that this is another thing that’s been discussed between her and the Board. 

“_________.” She tries again, her small, brittle looking hands balled into fists on her desk. “This wasn’t my idea. This was never, ever, what I wanted for you. I know how good you are. I know that you love this place, and I have only ever tested you because I know that you’re capable enough to pass. I promise you, I will try-”

“Try.” You repeat, wiping your eyes again. “Don’t bother. I resign, I guess. I’d put my two weeks in, but under the circumstances…” She gazes up at you, grimaces, then nods, sharply. 

“Good girl.” She mutters to herself. “Okay. Alright.” She stands up, and walks out from behind her desk, fury in her eyes, her small body perfectly upright, and for a second, you truly believe she’s about to hit you. But no, she claps your shoulder in a gesture of affection, then holds out her hand to shake yours - to shake your right hand, the skeleton, the goddamn fucking _skarm._ You blink at her, totally thrown off kilter.

“...Aren’t you going to yell at me? To say I’m being ungrateful?” You finally say, in a small voice. She shakes her head. 

“No. I’m not.” She waits until she’s sure she has your attention, and says, very clearly. “And if I forget to tell you not to tell the media about this conversation, it is certainly because I am a ‘silly woman who’s getting on in years and thinks that she’s worth more than she is.’” She sounds like she’s quoting someone, and you realize, at last, that Barb had probably gone to bat for you and failed. The thought sobers you considerately. 

“I loved this place.” You mutter again. She glances around. 

“Tell them that.” She whispers. “Tell them all that. I love this place too, and this isn’t what we stand for. We are a place of learning.” Her voice grows stronger. “We are a place that strives to respect all living beings. We’re ambassadors for the beings that humans hurt or fear or slaughter or throw away because they don’t understand.” She says, then suddenly slumps. “God, listen to me. Moralizing, after what they did - what I …” She trails off, and shakes her head. “Sometimes, when you can’t work inside the system, you have to work outside of it.” She says, after a moment.

“Please… Undyne - she can’t just get another job.” You begin, and Barb nods again, that quick, deliberate motion. 

“Don’t worry. I don’t think they’d be stupid enough…” She sighs, trailing off again. “I’m so sorry. I am so sorry, ________. I have faith. You’ll find your way home. I am sorry that you…” Her voice grows thick again, and you stand there, stock still, and finally shake her extended hand. 

“I’m sorry too.” You say, but you’re clearly not apologizing. You walk out the door to her office, feeling shaky, send Undyne a quick text, and then don’t even hesitate, just cut a door back to your house in the hallway, striding through before anyone can see you. You emerge in the den, and make it for all of about a minute before you burst out sobbing, curling up on the edge of the couch and weeping until your head is a pounding mess. Ghost hears you first, and hops up on your lap as you sniffle. Lesser Dog joins you a while later, and you manage to find the courage to text Sans and tell him the bad news, with the dog curled up on your feet, whining, the old cat stretched out across your lap.

sans (2:43 PM): shit  
sans (2:43 PM): hang on

And that’s it. You half expect him to come barrelling in the room a second later, but the minutes tick by, and he doesn’t appear, and eventually, even though you feel fully irrational about this, you begin to weep again, just wishing that he was there, or that he was texting you, or something. 

You’re startled, several minutes later, by the sound of low male voices, coming from the direction of the front door - had you left that open? No, you hadn’t even come through a door! You’re standing up, scooting Ghost off your lap, at the same time that LD begins to growl, but then you hear Sans call your name.

“Uh. In here!” Your voice is a creaky mess, and you’re sure your face is splotchy as hell, and you’re just bewildered as to why Sans is here with someone else.

There’s the sound of two sets of footsteps heading towards the den, and then, around the corner, comes Sans and a sheepish looking Capra. You’re thrown off enough to take a step backwards, but you manage to squeak an “Oh, hi…” out. Sans winces, and turns to glare at his employer. 

“told you she wouldn’t want you here, asshat.” He grumbles, and you’re somewhat taken aback by his casual tone towards his new employer, then fully surprised from the way Capra can’t keep a smile off his face at Sans’ insult, before he manages to look appropriately solemnly at you, anyway. “sorry babe. he _insisted_.” Sans hisses, crossing over to stand by your side. “said he could make it better.”

“_________, I wanted to give you some options - oh, hey, is that Ghost? Ghost is still alive? How the hell old is that cat?”

“capra!”

“Right! Right. So, the donors don’t want you at the aquarium?” Capra raises an immaculate black eyebrow, boyish glee on his handsome face. “Want me to buy ‘em out? I can buy ‘em out. I can give your aquarium a big enough donation they’ll be begging-” You can’t help it, you let out a slightly wild laugh.

“Peter, I don’t think this is the kind of thing you can just throw money at.” You say, distractedly wiping your eyes. “And I’m sure your investors would be pissed that you spent a crazy amount of EbbCo money out of spite.” He purses his lips at that, then grunts. 

“Kay. Point made. I could do a personal donation, but I’m not sure I could sway things enough… okay. Then, option two. Come back home.” He says earnestly. “Come work for us. I know you’re smart. I know that for a fact. The last time I was in this house, you were a kid doing homework years above your age level. Plus. You’re smart enough to shack up with this beautiful idiot,” He nods at Sans, “so I’m certain you’ve got plenty to bring to the table.” Sans tries to hide a smirk, and Capra grins at him, before, again, remembering what he’s there for. You blink, feeling, for the second time that day, like the floor has just dropped out from under you. 

“What… what would I even do there?” You mutter. 

“Anything you like. You like fish? We’ve got a team running tests on the camouflage abilities of cuttlefish right now, want to get in on that?” He offers.

“...They’re not fish.” You say, feeling totally lost. 

“What?”

“Um. Cuttlefish. They’re, uh, mollusks.” You point out, and he claps his hands together. 

“See? Perfect. You’ll fit right in.” He sighs, when you still look at him like he’s got three heads - which would honestly not be that weird, in the post-barrier township of Mt. Ebott. “Okay. How about this. We’ll call it an internship. Say, three months. Pay’s shit.” He offers. 

“jesus, pal, sell her a little harder.” Sans says wryly, raising an eyebrow ridge, but Capra’s looking right at you now. 

“No, no, I get it. She’s not a charity case, I shouldn’t act like it. But, hey, an internship. Take the time. Learn if it’s right for you. We’ll say three months, like the summer interns do. S’what I did for your parents, remember? If you think things are cooled down enough at the aquarium by then, well, then no problem, back to the aquarium you go. If you like it where you are? We’ll see what full time position you want.” Capra offers. 

“Um…” 

“Take some time. Think it through.” He says, and then leans down, looking rather pleased, when Ghost wanders over to butt his head against Capra’s black suit pants. “Look at you, you old sonuvabitch.” He says, reaching to scratch Ghost under his chin. Ghost rumbles out a purr, and LD, at your side, gives you an inquisitive glance. You nod at him, after a second, and LD rushes over to get scratches from the sleek, handsome man too. This gives you a chance to look over at Sans.

“sorry.” He sighs. “he wasn’t gonna let me take off to be there for you unless he gave me a ride home and got to make his pitch.” You clear your throat. 

“You think I should be an intern, then?” You’re almost certain that Capra’s listening closely. Sans hesitates. 

“up to you. but - nobody’s gonna say anything shitty to you at ebbco. they’re forty percent monster now.”

“Nobody but Doris.” You point out, and Capra looks up, grinning, no longer even pretending not to eavesdrop. 

“I had it out with Doris. She’s very, very, profoundly sorry.” He drawls, his eyes flashing - there’s something vaguely menacing in that smile. 

“yeah, yeah, you lectured an old lady. you’re a total badass.” Sans grumbles, and you suddenly feel awful that you hadn’t really been asking more than the most basic questions about what’s been going on at EbbCo, these past few weeks - because clearly, Sans and Capra are tight, much closer than you’d had any idea about. That, on its own, seems like it needs several hours of follow up questions; you’re almost curious enough to forget how miserable you are. 

“Okay. I’ll try it out. While things cool down.” You decide, not sure if you’re more swayed by the fact that Sans so clearly likes him, or that Ghost does. Capra beams, and lunges forward to shake your hand - you’re dazzled, as his firm grip closes around your skeletal fingers, that you’d lost the only job you’d ever cared about just like this, only a few hours ago, and now you’ve got another one lined up already.

“You won’t regret it.” He flashes his brilliant smile again. 

“do i still get the rest of the day off?” Sans drawls. Capra sighs, releasing your hand. 

“I suppose a bargain’s a bargain. Yeah, sure.” He decides, and Sans smirks.

“k. see you tomorrow, capra.” It’s a clear dismissal. Capra apes hurt feelings, stepping backwards and putting a hand on his chest. 

“You’re not going to show me your lovely home, invite me for dinner?” He complains. 

“nah, you’ve got work to do. see you tomorrow.” Sans says with a wink. 

“Gonna teleport me back?” Capra practically pouts. 

“fat chance.” 

“One of these days, you handsome devil, you’re gonna take me on a ride-along.” Capra complains, then turns back to you. “All joking aside, _______, I’m thrilled. I look forward to getting to know you again. Okay, kids, good work. Adios. Stay safe.” He tips a wave at both of you, and then he’s off, striding confidently through your house, and out the front door. You stare at Sans for a long moment, then groan and collapse back on the couch. He sits next to you, and tentatively wraps an arm around your back. 

“Okay.” You mutter, after a few minutes. 

“ok?” He repeats. 

“Okay. What the hell has been going on at EbbCo while I’ve been busy sulking?” You demand, and, again, he finds it almost impossible to hide his grin.


	66. In Which We Find Out All of EbbCo's Dirty Secrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YES MORE ART
> 
> [So so sad](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140734184916/lost-porpoise)
> 
> [this is capra but a goat for reasons](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140722938671/ok-this-was-an-accident-i-swear-it-started-as-a)
> 
> [and goddamn mod, who illustrated the hell out of last chapter](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140713072931/mod2amaryllis-totalskeletontrash-cool-chap)

“Sans, seriously, I’m sorry. I’ve been so wrapped up in my own shit right now, I haven’t really been asking, I just figured, you know, the um, vague grunts when I asked how work was going was answer enough.” He exhales through his teeth. 

“i didn’t want to… i don’t know.” He says, tracing your spine through your uniform polo. “rub it in?” You sigh at that. 

“Hey. Just because things aren’t going so great for me right now doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to have good things too.” You point out. He frowns, then slowly nods. “So…” After a second, you sit up a little straighter, then turn to drape your legs across his. “C’mon. Tell me what’s been going on. If I’m gonna end up working there, I need to know how you and… my old… babysitter… became best buddies. Oh, that’s weird. He babysat me and now my boyfriend and him are clearly in some sort of bromance.” You try out, wiping your eyes distractedly again. 

“heh. i guess that is weird. ok.” He leans back into the couch, stroking your shin distractedly. “i guess this is what happened.”

\-----------------------------------------------

What had happened, of course, was that he’d showed up to EbbCo on the morning after New Year’s in a ridiculously good mood. He almost wanted someone to ask him why he was in such a good mood, so he could smirk and say something like, “heh, no reason,” even though he knew very well that the reason was that his girlfriend had gotten handsy in the shower. _Very_ handsy. 

Heh. 

He’d had to wait outside the door until it was 9:05 AM - he could have been in there at nine, on time, but that set a really bad precedent. He’d strolled into the lobby, having greeted the small parade of monsters that he actually knew, all heading into work. And there, waiting at the desk and staring at the computer monitor of the monster receptionist, had been Capra.

“Well, there’s the latest acquisition to my monster collection!” Capra had called, grinning brilliantly. He couldn’t help it. He tried not to, but he grinned back, just for a moment, at the ridiculously over the top greeting. 

“i love it when a boss is calm and reassuring.” He’d said, glancing around. “so, uh, what’s the deal here, do i need to fill out paperwork, or -”

“Already done. Except for the signatures, I still need those, but… hey, you can sign your soul away at the end of the day, c’mon, let’s get to work!” Capra urged. He stared back at him, amused by the human’s eagerness. 

“you’re like… the world’s most sinister puppy.” He found himself saying. 

“Says the wisecracking skeleton. Come _on!_ We’ve got shit to do!” Capra demanded, jerking his head at the elevators. “Oh, and Gloria!” He stopped mid-step, whirling to look at the receptionist. 

“Yes, Mr. Capra?” The monster’s head - er, hand? - opened in an inquisitive gesture. 

“That video of the kittens with hiccups is goddamn adorable. You send that to my email, understood? Like, stat. I need to show everyone I know. Actually, scratch that. Just send it to everyone I know.” He resumed walking, then turned to glare at Sans. “You coming or what?” 

He followed, feeling just a tiny bit off of his game. It was hard to stay calm and relaxed when you had literally no idea what the person you were speaking to was gonna throw at you. 

Inside the elevator, though, Capra let the doors close and hesitated, his hand hovering over the buttons. “Okay. Alright. This, right here, what we’re about to have? Serious talk right now, you understand?” He said, turning abruptly to look at Sans. 

“uh, sure.” 

“Alright.” Capra said warily. “So, a lot of the equipment for the geothermal generator is, as you might imagine, underground. For, well, obvious reasons.” He said, running his hand through his glossy hair. “If, for any reason, you are _not_ okay with working underground, you just need to tell me, understood? We’ll find a workaround. As it is, we break every two hours. Every monster, every human. Fifteen minutes on the surface, got it? No working through, no ‘just this one time.’ Fifteen minutes of being outside, or at least in the cafeteria where there’s some goddamn windows, every two hours.” He said, and nodded at the elevator panel. “These are on a separate generator from the rest of the facility. They aren’t ever going to go offline. You can get one when you need it. Even so, there are stairs out on every floor, and they can only lock from the outside, understand?” He locked eyes with Sans, and the monster could tell instantly that it isn’t the first time that Capra’s given this speech. “You will never get stuck down there. Ever. And if you ever feel like you need a moment to breathe and it’s not your fifteen, take five, see the sun. Got it?” 

He’d mulled this over, a sinking feeling of resignation twisting in his ribs. 

“goddamn it.” He finally muttered. 

“What?” Capra’s wary concern colored his voice. 

“i think i actually like you.” He admitted unhappily, then nodded at the elevator panel. “okay, bossman, show me what we’re looking at down there.” 

\-------------------------------------

It got worse. Or maybe better. Sans wasn’t sure. He’d spent the next few days prowling around with Capra in the underground caverns that EbbCo had drilled down into in the year since the barrier had been taken down - it was a part of the same system that Hotland had been built into, of course. He had to admit, the humans were industrious! There were already mock generators running, different designs from different teams of clever humans, all of whom seemed entirely unsurprised to see a monster in their midst. And, well, why would they be surprised?? It seemed like any monster with any expertise in science was down here - Grillby’s sweet daughter, who had only just graduated school, was in the thick of it, securing a component to a larger prototype while up to her ankles in lava, while a crowd of humans and monsters looked on in awe. Every Vulkin Sans had ever met, and about twenty he hadn’t, they were all down here too, busily (and sweetly) attaching wires, flitting back and forth, consulting diagrams…

Madjicks were busy in the larger rooms, those that were more metal and electronic equipment than cavern and lava, muttering back and forth to their teams, always seemingly juggling twelve different clipboards. Capra knew them all, somehow, and would pull a team member aside every once in a while to greet (or introduce themselves to) Sans and show him what they were working on. 

Capra was always at his shoulder, in fact. He’d given up on pretending he was supervising fairly quickly, once Sans got a sense of the layout and what projects were going on. Now, he was just…

“The output should be three times as much as what we’re showing here.” He’d tapped on a clipboard, entering into what was another typical conversation. 

“no, it shouldn’t, dumbass, you can’t math.” 

“I can math like you’ve never seen before. I could math you senseless. We could have a math-off right now. You missed the back of the page.” 

“you didn’t tell me there was a back of the page!” 

“Oh, did you not develop goddamn double-sided printing in the Underground, Sans?”

“actually, no?”

“...Shit. Really?” He’s caught by surprise, and looks rather alarmed. 

“no! god! how dumb do you think we are?”

“Uncool, Skeletor.” Capra said, but like Sans, he couldn’t stop smiling. It was just… fun. To have someone on his level. Now, you, _you_ were on his level, you had been since the second he’d met you, but he couldn’t very well insult you, he was too busy loving the hell out of you-

\---------------------------------------

“Jesus! Thank god!” You interrupt Sans’ story. “You’ve got a more epic romance with this guy than you have with me!” His eyebrow ridges dart upwards, and he leans over to give you a slow, pointed kiss, one that leaves you all ragged and breathy by the time he’s done. 

“you were saying?” He drawls.

“Um…” You smile cheekily up at him, stretching your legs out on his lap. It’s so nice to see him out of his sulky, miserable mood, to hear him telling you how happy he is, that for the moment, your own woes seem so much more surmountable. “I forget. What made you kiss me like that?” He lets out a low chuckle, and kisses you once more, seeming… if anything, relieved.

\-------------------------------------

The bad thing had been, of course, that while he was here, doing what he loved best, you were suffering. Worst, still, Capra knew that. 

“Okay.” He’d grabbed Sans one morning, on his way in. “Remember ‘serious talk’ time? Remember how fun that was?” 

“oh god. what.” 

“It’s about _______. Oh, christ, don’t look at me like that. Once again, I’m not moving in on her. You’ve got a beautiful girlfriend who I happen to be very fond of. And she’s fond of me. And we go way back. And girls love me. That’s all.” Capra drawled, winking, then caught himself, just before Sans rose to the bait. “Shit. Sorry. I said serious talk. Okay. So, you’ve seen the websites, right?”

“websites?”

“Shit. Okay. So you haven’t seen the websites, right?” He repeated, in the exact same tone. “Well, there’s websites. There’s all sorts of bad shit. People… have it out for her right now. Like… again. This is serious talk. This is not good.” 

“how not good are we talkin’?”

“Search her name.” Capra nodded at Sans’ right pocket - he’d been spending so much time with Sans, that he knew exactly where Sans kept his phone. Sans grimaced, and then did as requested. It only took him a few minutes.

“oh.” His smile is gone, suddenly, as he sorted through the terrible comments and images. You wouldn’t tell him, of course, the details; you hadn’t wanted him to know the things that people screamed at you. But here they were, right where he couldn’t ignore.

“Hey. Please. Tell her to come here.” Capra urged. “It’s safe here. She’d be welcome. Among friends. Seriously, you’ve seen how everyone loves her mom and dad. Fuck, I still love her mom and dad. I was a goddamn pallbearer, did she tell you that?” No. You hadn’t. “And she’s smart. I knew her, you know her. We’d find a place for her.” He said, his blue eyes deep and sincere. 

“hey. look. we appreciate it but… she loves that job more than anything.” Sans finally said. “i don’t want to be the guy who makes it seem like i think she can’t do it. i know she can. i know things have been pretty rough right now, but-” 

“Okay. A lifeline, then. When things get rougher than this.” Capra says, and then quickly amends. “Well, ‘if.’”

And for a while, that had been the end of it, except that, well, every time he came home to you things were worse and worse, you were sadder and sadder… and there was more and more on those damn websites. The number of times he’d thought to tell you about what Capra had said, to beg you to take his offer just so you’d be somewhere safe - and say what you would about Capra, but EbbCo was safe for monsters! But then you’d force a smile, and he’d force one back, and you’d crawl up to bed, miserable, and just cling to each other, and he’d wish that he was carrying your burden, because, well, he was having so much fun and he felt like shit about it. 

And then, this morning had happened. 

“hey. capra. serious talk.” He’d been dreading this, but he’d been reaching this conclusion over the past two weeks. 

“Hm?” For once, Capra was up in his office, feet up on the desk, sorting through emails. Two goldfish swam behind him, in an immaculate, pristine, aquarium. 

“you know all those figures we’ve been running?”

“Sure.” Capra said, very dryly. 

“look, buddy, it’s not gonna work.”

“What do you mean?”

“we just don’t have the tech to pull that much power from the earth yet. doesn’t work. we could power this building, sure. maybe another. not the whole county. not with any of the prototypes. can’t be done.” 

“Can’t be done!? You did it before!” Capra had said, startled. Sans winced. 

“sure. but that wasn’t just tech, it was magic. like, a lot of magic.” 

“So? We’ve got monsters! Let’s do some magic!” Capra said, grinning again. 

“uh. not sure it’s that easy. you know, asgore said, we can’t use magic in human jobs. s’against the rules until we get all our rights. besides. it’s a lot to ask. fuck, capra, why don’t we just use the old core?”

“Because.” Capra groaned, rubbing his forehead. “I’m not even allowed far enough in the underground to look at the damn thing, much less start laying down wires. Not until, you know, you get all your rights.” He heaved a sigh. “Damn it! Can’t you go behind his back?” 

“look, i mean, it would take some fire mages anyway, and that was never my speed.” 

“Oh yeah? What’s your speed?” Suddenly, he was interested again. 

“look. i make shortcuts, that’s it. well. kinda. well… fuck, it’s pretty personal!” 

“No, no, that’s fine. Let your feelings get in the way. It’s just the entire planet that’s gonna burn up if we keep going the way we’re going, that’s all.” Capra’s sarcasm was as sharp as he’d ever heard it. Sans sighed, and gave a very, _very_ truncated explanation, that had Capra wide eyed by the end of it. 

“Holy shit.” 

“it’s not that big-”

“Holy SHIT.” 

“fuck, i shouldn’t have told you that-”

“Are you kidding? This changes everything. With something like that?? We could-”

“hang tight.” Sans interrupted. He’d gotten a text from you. The horror must have showed on his face, because Capra picked up on it instantly. 

“Hey. What’s up?”

“...hey, i need the rest of the day off.” He’d said, staring at your text. 

\----------------------------------------

“and so that’s basically it.” He concludes with a small shrug. You sigh. 

“You could have told me.” You say, and he nods. 

“i know. i know. i just didn’t want to… i don’t know.” He leans forward to kiss you again, and you’re relieved to see that the man you’d fallen in love with is back in the room with you, after nearly two weeks of half-absence. 

“So… what do you think?” You ask, when he parts. 

“about capra? i like him a lot. he’s funny. i think he genuinely wants to make the world a better place. i think he’d stop at nothing to do it, too. i think that he would legitimately kill to do it.” He says, his tone growing darker as he talks, until you feel goosebumps rising on your arms. 

“That doesn’t sound like a better place.” You mutter. “One that requires death to kick it off.” 

“yeah. you’re seeing my issue.” He breathes, and sighs. “god, i’ll be happy to have you somewhere safe though.” 

“Yeah, unless he decides killing me is better for the world.” You drawl, and he snorts.

“well, these are desperate times. ‘safe’ is relative.” Still, he seems like a weight has been lifted off of his shoulders, and he leans over to kiss you yet _again_ \- oh, hello, Mr. Affectionate Skeleton, nice to see you back in action! He keeps on kissing you, in fact, until the garage door opens and Undyne comes scrambling inside a minute later, already bellowing invective at the aquarium at the top of her lungs. Well, that needs to be addressed. “you okay for this?” He checks, and you sigh and nod. 

“Uh. Yeah. I think. Maybe we can have some time to talk before bed, though? Just us? Upstairs?” You offer, and he gives you a sweet smile. 

“sounds great.”

“I WILL THROW SPEARS THROUGH ALL OF THEIR WINDOWS! THERE WON’T BE A WINDOW LEFT BY THE TIME I’M DONE! __________, I AM GOING TO AVENGE YOU!” Undyne’s bellowing, and you have to brace yourself for what promises to be another … less than fun talk. 

Still, something’s thawed, and maybe healed a little bit, because in spite of everyone’s righteous fury on your behalf, nobody’s faking smiles anymore, especially not Sans, and it feels like maybe things are beginning to be set right again. Maybe the world wasn’t such a bad place. No. The world was fine. The people in it could sometimes suck, but the world was perfect, really. 

Still, it definitely wasn’t worth killing for.


	67. In Which You Don't Do A Single Embarassing Thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boy oh boy, do you guys ever have some opinions on Capra!  
> Such as making the official goddamn Capra/Sans shipping name... Cans. 
> 
> Cans.  
> Okay!
> 
> Fanart update!  
> [How beautiful is this one??](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140779923166/submitted-by-meiffin-quick-warmup-from-that-one)
> 
>  

Undyne is absolutely inconsolable. You probably should have seen that coming, but you were busy mourning your own loss (and being absolutely bewildered that Sans and Capra were best friends suddenly). When she finds you though, and you see the slick tear tracks on her scaly skin, you have to stand up. Sans doesn’t protest that you’re moving away from him, which is something of an improvement - he really had been clinging, recently! He stands up too, after a second, and strolls after you. By that point, you already have Undyne wrapped in a tight hug, though, your forehead pressed against the muscular woman’s shoulder. Undyne sniffs. 

“I’m gonna quit.” She mumbles. 

“Like hell you are.” You growl, hugging her tighter. “This is just temporary, okay?”

“Then I’m gonna show ‘em how much they need you. They’ll see how dumb they were, when things start going-”

“Nope. Hey.” You back up slightly, looking up into her yellow eye. “I’m counting on you. I’m mad at them too, but the animals come first. Okay? So, make sure, you know, Yellowband gets her fish, you’ll need to feed her special because she’ll lose any race with that foot the way it is still. And the chicks, you know, they need extra, they’re still growing-”

“I know.” She mutters. “You taught me good, pal. I’ll take really good care of them. Next best thing to having you, until you come back.” She sniffs again, and hugs you tight once more. “It’s gonna suck without you.” She says morosely. “You’re my only friend there. I… I _can’t believe they made you leave._ ” She finally hisses. “________… it’s not fair. It’s not fair!” She growls, releasing you to stomp her foot. “You love that place more than anyone! You love all the animals so much, but you love the whole place too! You told me it was the only place you felt safe.”

“babe.” Sans has to interject at that, staring up at you. 

“Not anymore, baby. Now I have you. Both of you.” You look between them. “But… I do love it there. I’m not going to lie and tell you that it doesn’t suck.” You step back and slump slightly. Sans takes the opportunity to move to your side, rubbing your back slowly. 

“It’s just… you don’t deserve this. You’re the last person that deserves this!” Undyne finally sighs. You take a deep breath. This has been on your mind for a while. 

“I don’t know. I’ve been thinking. I’ve been so lucky. So lucky, up until now. I mean, you guys know about humans, right? What we do to each other?” Sans and Undyne both look at you, quizzical. “Compared to monsters, we’re all more or less the same looking, and you’d think that would be enough, right, for us all to get along? But we have always, always, had this ugliness in us. It’s like there’s some part of being a human that makes us just… fear and hate anyone who doesn’t look like the way that our culture tells us a human should look. It’s the worst thing about humans, that we’ve got that in us.” You say, rubbing your forehead.

“babe, you don’t act like that!” Sans seems alarmed by the thought. 

“Well, I do my very best not to.” You concede. “Reacting out of fear like that, it’s not… Not all of us who do it, I suppose. Not all the time. But enough of us, I think. They hate you if you aren’t the right color, or you believe the wrong thing, or if you don’t fall neatly into a box of being ‘male’ or ‘female’, or if you love the ‘wrong’ person, or you don’t have enough money… I dunno. I could go on and on.” You heave a sigh. “Up until now, I really… I don’t know. I’ve been pretty lucky, I guess, in that I’ve never really gotten _too_ much of that hate and fear that we humans dish out to each other. Never seen this much before, either. I know if I lived other places on earth, it could probably be different, but Mt. Ebott has always been a pretty tolerant place. At least, that’s what I thought. And now, for the first time, I’m getting some _real_ hate, and all I can think of is ‘poor me,’ and that I don’t deserve this. But like… nobody deserves it, when we humans act like this! Nobody ever deserves this!” You sigh, and look at the two of them. They both look lost for words, but they’re following closely. 

“The barrier opened, and we made your lives hell. It didn’t even take us a week, before the first human on monster attack. Not a fucking week.” You say, then grit your teeth. “How could I feel so sorry for myself, when this is what you guys have been getting-”

“‘s not a zero sum game.” Sans says softly. “you can’t think like that. you’re totally entitled to feel hurt, or...” 

“Betrayed.” Undyne supplies, nodding. “I don’t know if I can speak for Sans, but… yeah. This last year has been rough, I suppose. But… I mean, we found people like you up here, too.”

“uh, well, her in particular.” Sans points out. 

“Yeah, but it’s not just her. What about Tommy, or any of the other humans that were here on New Year’s Eve?” Undyne reminds him, then grins. “Fuhuhuhu, maybe you forgot about them because you were too busy grabbing each other’s asses in random hallways to even notice our guests-”

“Oh my god.” 

“i don’t even have an ass.”

“-Or Alphys’ students, god, they love her so much, they follow her around like ducklings!” Undyne charges on, unbothered. “And Barb, she went out of her way to get a job for me… sorry. Sorry, I shouldn’t-”

“No, it’s okay, it’s not her fault.” You say. “Barb tried to stop them, Undyne.” 

“Oh…” Undyne tries not to register the clear relief she feels, discovering that Barb still is the person she’d believed she was. You give her a slightly sad smile, then shake your head. 

“I don’t know. I just… I’m so frustrated. I’m so sad. I’m so… ashamed, of my species. And I’m angry. And at the same time, I just feel like I don’t deserve to be so angry, because so many people have it so much worse, and because I know for a fact that you’ve both been through worse from humans, and I feel shitty that I didn’t really understand what it was like for you until now, even though I tried.” You sum up. Both monsters regard you solemnly, then Sans reaches for your left hand, his fingers pressing against soft skin. 

“we love you so much. not, like, in spite of you being a human. we love you because you’re… you. and being a human is part of who you are. and, a lot of the time? humans can be really, really great. they’re curious. and the best of them are like the best kinds of monsters - when they see something new, they react with kindness, not fear. that’s the kind of human you are.” He says quietly. “god, you know the kind of human you are? here’s an example. just one moment that proves who you are. an enormous skull tears through a tiny tear in the void when you’re just barely figuring out your magic, and you, you don’t panic, you don’t scream, you scratch it on the nose and name it spot and take it for walks because you love it.”

“Frisk named her Spot.” You point out, smiling in spite of yourself. 

“Yeah, because Frisk rules too! We love Frisk! And… we really do love you.” Undyne agrees. “We all love you.” You look between them, and sigh, then smile.

“I love you guys too.” You murmur, and, not really thinking about how strange it might be for Undyne or Sans, pull them both close once more, hugging them tightly, an arm around each of them. You loved all your new friends, your new family, of course, but these two… you didn’t know what you’d do without them. You could barely remember how you’d lived before they came into your life. They both seem a little surprised to be part of this family hug - Sans was certainly closer to Alphys than her fiancee, after all - but they don’t hesitate to return the gesture. After a second, Sans nods back at the couch. 

“hey, you guys sit down, k? i’ll make you some tea, we’ll watch something?” He offers. 

“And some aspirin?” Your head is still pounding from crying so much. “...And a snack?” You murmur. “For all of us, baby? I missed breakfast and lunch, and I haven’t seen you eat more than a few bites this whole week.” He gives you a quick, guilty smile, and nods. 

“yeah. i know. okay.” He says, and pecks you on the cheek before moving, surprisingly quietly, towards the kitchen. Undyne gives you a reassuring smile, and then says, 

“Alright, nerd, what do you want to watch?” You squint at her for a second, thinking, then smile. 

“Um. Avengers?” 

\----------------------------------

Not even an hour later, you’re fast asleep, sitting on the couch between Sans and Undyne. You’re sitting much closer to both of them then there’s really any need to be, other than the fact that right now, it feels good to be sandwiched between these people who you love, and who love you in return. 

The combination of the soothing tea, the Girl Scout cookies Sans had produced from somewhere, the comfortable warmth of two bodies next to you, and the feeling of clever bones alternating between massaging your neck and playing with your hair … all of this combined has your head comfortably settled on Sans’ shoulder as you doze and occasionally let out a tiny snore (that both monsters need to restrain themselves from either snickering or saying “awww” at.)

Sans is pretty entertained by your movie choice, particularly when he understands why. Not that Capra is exactly like Iron Man - he’s younger, for one, and seems decidedly more idealistic than Tony Stark. He also speaks much faster, and with a wild amount of enthusiasm beneath the very dry, sarcastic affect of his voice; Capra really is the world’s most sinister puppy, Sans reflects, then snickers again when you distract him by letting out another tiny snore. 

“Man, she’s really out, huh?” Undyne remarks. 

“yeah.” He smooths your hair slowly. “can’t blame her. worst day ever.” It had also, he thinks to himself, been, well, a while since the two of you had last - heh, goddamn it, grow up, Sans (nope, not gonna happen, he immediately argued back with the little voice in his head that kept trying to make him be mature) - since you’d last filled up the ol’ tank. So to speak. Heh. Well, neither of you had been anywhere near the right mood recently; you’d been so exhausted by the constant barrage of insults that you’d been falling asleep basically the second your head hit the pillow, and he’d been reading those stupid fucking websites, the ones that went into detail about all the disgusting things that Sans was supposedly doing to you, or worse, all the things that the forum members wanted to do to you to “teach you your place.” 

Ugh. He leans over to press a kiss to your forehead, just thinking about it, then resumes stroking your hair. In any event, you’d still been doing pretty big magic - he knew you’d made a doorway back home today, and you’d taken to freeing Spot from the void almost instantly when you got home, just to spend some time with a creature that reacted to you the exact opposite way that your jeering “fans” acted whenever you were in the view of the public recently. He knew that the source of your ability to do that must be just the ambient magic you were pulling from the monsters, by now, and he had a very strong hypothesis that, without the stores of extra power (which he was _more than willing_ to lend you), using just ambient magic to make shortcuts was draining on the human body. Well, okay, he could fix that, now that the air was cleared, now that he felt better about your safety… 

“You’ve got a really weird look on your face.”

“do i?” He yawns pointedly, trying hard to stop the blue flush from creeping onto his face, then turns to Undyne. “hey. thanks for comin’ back home early today for her. you mean a hell of a lot to her, i know she appreciated it.” Undyne scoffs quietly. 

“Eh, you were already here. You’d already saved the day, getting her that job. I just came in yelling like a huge loser. Ugh, I get so angry sometimes, I just… man, she must have felt like she needed to take care of me, too.” Sans blinks at this, his fingers falling still in your hair. 

“jeez, you really don’t know, huh?” He says, looking Undyne over, surprised. 

“Huh?” 

“you don’t understand how much… like, the _scale_ of how important you are to her.”

“Was that a freaking pun, Sans, because -”

“i touched her soul. and, no, just for the record, i didn’t spell that _sole_ like the fish, i’m being serious.” Undyne snorts. 

“When are you ever being serious? And, yeah, I know. I kinda wanted to yell at you for that, punk, you knew her for like three point two milliseconds and you’re getting those grubby bones all over my bestie’s soul?” Sans winces. He probably deserves that. 

“yeah, i know. exigent circumstances. i agree, though, it was way fast. coulda been a mistake.” 

“Sure as hell could have! What if you weren’t as well suited to her as you thought you were? Do you know how much you could have hurt her?” 

“i know. i know.” He accepts the admonishment. “but i wasn’t talking about the first time. she let me hold it again, new year’s.” Undyne blinks at this, then seems to piece their behavior from back on New Years’ together, the way that they’d returned from their trip to the mountain seeming so perfectly content with each other. She blushes slightly. This isn’t something that monsters generally talk about, not monsters who aren’t quite close, anyway. Undyne and Sans had certainly become much better friends since they’d started living together, but Undyne seems nervous that a boundary is being crossed right now. 

“Yo, are you sure she’d want you telling me this -”

“yes.” He _is_ sure, because he’s held your soul. “quit _carping_ on me, i’m tryin’ to tell you something.” He gives her an obnoxious grin, and she opens her mouth to complain, then her eye narrows and she nods, giving Sans the gesture to go on. He clears his throat - a fully unnecessary habit, there was literally nothing there to clear - and says, “god, undyne, she loves you. what i saw this time, when i touched that soul… it looks like every time you touch a soul, it really is different each time. but this time… you opened up a new chapter for her. like, that’s how she thinks of time. before-undyne, post-undyne. ‘s not me who made her life better again. i just stepped in while her life was getting better, and that was only happening because of you.” He says, quiet and serious. Undyne bites her lip, looking down at you. 

“It took me a while to even know if she liked me, or if she was just being polite. She was so cautious with everything. God, remember when we first knew her, she’d still wince after every smile? Like someone was about to punish her for being happy?” She reminisces, then glances up at Sans. “It wasn’t me, who fixed that. Not at all. That one was on you. The first night we were all over at this house, watching that anime, and we ended up crashing here? Me and Alph and Paps woke up first, and you’d managed to get her all curled up and sleeping on your lap, you crafty loser.” She grins. “God, you hadn’t even kissed her yet and she was still asleep in your arms, on your lap! Where did you even get game like that, numbskull?” He has to grin, remembering that. 

“eh, wasn’t game. i never had that. she fell asleep out on the beach, showin’ me the stars. i just carried her back inside and then… i dunno, i didn’t want to put her down.” He laughed quietly, looking at you, the sheer adoration he felt for you lighting up his eyes, his soul. 

“Damn, you’re so sweet when it comes to her it gives me a toothache. You must bottle up all the saltiness you can’t use on her and just explode on someone random every once in a while.” Undyne laughs, and Sans, thinking of Capra, smirks and shrugs. “Anyway, I was gonna leave you guys be and let you sleep, but then I noticed… she was smiling, in her sleep. No wincing, no guilty looks, no apologies. Which totally meant that Alphys and me were right in trying to set you guys up!” Undyne says, and Sans’ eyesockets widen. 

“you were tryin’ to set us up?” He’s honestly shocked, because he’d been totally unaware of this development. 

“Fuhuhuhu, pal, we had an elaborate plan to get you to run into each other. Multiple times, if necessary. Alph was convinced you’d be perfect together.”

“well, sure, she’s a damn genius, but - hang on, you didn’t bribe l.d. to eat the lizard, yeah?” Undyne bursts out laughing at that, and you let out a sleepy groan. Sans and Undyne immediately fall silent, waiting until you settle back down and emit another tiny snore before they continue. 

“Heck no, I like lizards!” Undyne finally laughs, much more quietly. “Nah. She just… happened to be there at the same time as you, dork. Some real destiny shit.” She gazes at you, and smiles softly, then looks up at the screen. “You gotta take care of her at work. Hopefully you can do a better job than me.” 

“undyne, ‘s not your fault some humans are assholes.” He interjects quickly, and she grins at him suddenly. 

“Listen to you. ‘Some humans.’ Not ‘all humans are assholes but Frisk’, that was like your motto back in August.” 

“i’ve learned a lot, since then. my hypothesis was wrong. good scientist isn’t afraid to admit that.” He says, then adds. “i’ll keep her safe. promise.” Undyne nods after a moment, satisfied by this. 

“Good. And… I don’t know. Watch that Capra, yeah? I know, I’ve heard through the rumormill that you guys are really buddy-buddy these days. Just remember - Asgore told you to report back to him for a reason. He thinks something’s up. And I don’t want ________ in harm’s way.” 

“none of us do.” He scratches your scalp absently, right at that spot you particularly like, and you emit a moan in response that would have absolutely mortified you, were you awake to hear it. Both Sans and Undyne fall perfectly still, cheeks suddenly flushed, refusing to make eye contact. 

“Welp. Jeez. That was hot.” Undyne finally mutters. 

“we’re never telling her that happened.” Sans says, carefully moving his hand to your shoulder, cheeks still bright blue.

“Fine.” Undyne says too easily, a look in her eye that Sans is beginning to recognize as the ‘this is totally going in the manga’ look. She waits a few seconds, during which they’re both relieved to have the tension cut by the sound of Papyrus’ tires crunching down the driveway. 

“i don’t think capra would hurt her. i genuinely don’t. but i also kinda think he might have murdered her, uh, parents, so… don’t worry. i’ll be keeping an eye on him.” Sans finally answers Undyne’s question. 

“What do you think? You think he’s a good guy?” Undyne sounds genuine. 

“i like the hell out of him. in a different timeline, i think that he coulda been to me what _______ is to you. my best human buddy of all time.” Sans grins. 

“...But if he tries to hurt _______?” Undyne prompts. 

“uh. then nobody will ever be able to find his body.” Sans says, very dryly, sitting up a little straighter as he hears Papyrus clattering through the garage and into the house, knowing that the quiet and peace of the moment is very shortly about to end. Undyne looks down at you, then up at Sans. 

“That’s the exact answer I was looking for.” A look of understanding passes between them, just before Papyrus comes screaming in, arms full of flowers and chocolate and little trinkets he’d clearly picked up for you when he heard the bad news. 

They both loved this human, and they were _done_ with seeing you get hurt.


	68. In Which Nobody Flirts Really Terribly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS CHAPTER IS KINDA SHORT BECAUSE I FELL ASLEEP IN THE MIDDLE OF IT?  
> AND ALSO BECAUSE NEXT CHAPTER IS LONG.  
> AND IN THE MORNING I NEED TO EDIT THIS TO INCLUDE FANART BECAUSE THERE IS SOME GREAT FANART, YOU KIDS REMIND ME, I'M JUST SO SLEEP.

You awoke with a disoriented start, your heart racing, but the heavy arm around your shoulders almost instantly puts you at ease; he’s not clinging to you, just holding you affectionately, and your subconscious notices the difference and instantly supplies that everything is okay. You gather yourself, then glance up at Papyrus, the source of the loud noise that had woken you up. He’s barely visible behind a armful of beautiful blue and white flowers, and it seems like in between the blossoms, he’s tucked all sorts of things - you distinctly see a heart shaped chocolate box, and what looks like a Han Solo figurine. 

“_______, I’M SO SORRY! SANS SAID THAT YOU WERE REALLY HURT WHEN THEY MADE YOU LEAVE THE PENGUINS, SO I MADE YOU A ‘GET WELL SOON’ ARRANGEMENT!” Papyrus cries, shoving the pile of flowers and knickknacks right into your lap. You blink sleepily, glancing from Papyrus to Undyne to Sans and then back at Papyrus. 

“Thank you so much, Paps!” You yawn, looking closer at the “arrangement.” It’s really… something. “Are these cut out pictures of… John Stamos, though?”

“YES, THE HUMAN ACTOR! I HEARD YOU TELL UNDYNE THAT HE STILL HAD A HOT BUTT! I LOOKED FOR PICTURES OF HIS BUTT BUT ASGORE SAID HE DIDN’T HAVE THAT TYPE OF MAGAZINE!” 

“oh my god.” Sans groans quietly next to you. Undyne lets out a strangled sounding breath.

“Why did Asgore have regular pictures of John Stamos, though?” You suddenly need to know, which makes Undyne lose it entirely, snorting with undignified laughter, while Sans is making a show of acting like he feels threatened by the actor. 

“no, ‘s fine, whatever, you can just... rub it in that i don’t have a butt.” He drawls, and Papyrus claps his hand to his mouth. 

“BROTHER! HOW TERRIBLY INCONSIDERATE OF ME! SHOULD WE MAKE ONE OUT OF PAPER MACHE SO ________ WILL FALL BACK IN LOVE WITH YOU?” He says urgently, which makes you finally just lose it - you close your eyes, leaning back against Sans and beginning to shake with laughter. Undyne, who’s only now regained her composure, takes one look at Sans’ expression and gives up again, wailing with hysterical giggles. Sans groans again, but he tolerates you giggling into his shoulder, distractedly pulling one of the white flowers out of the arrangement and twirling it between his fingers. 

“I think your butt is cute.” You finally tell Sans, wiping your eyes. “Or your tailbone I guess? Coccyx?”

“mmm, i know you love my cocc-” His tone is low and playful, and Undyne, seeing immediately where _that_ joke is going, clears her throat and looks pointedly at Papyrus. Sans rolls his eyes, and says “coccyx,” very, very clearly. Papyrus stands there, an innocent smile on his face, as you struggle mightily to catch your breath and stop laughing. 

“Thank you, Paps. You’re very sweet.” You finally manage, gathering all the flowers and miscellaneous other gifts in your arms and standing up. “Let me just put this in water, okay? Then we can make some dinner and play a game or something tonight?”

“You sure?” Undyne says quietly. “I know… you haven’t really been having the best time with our um, forced fun for ________, these last few days.” 

“I’m sure.” You promise. “I’m… okay. I’m mad, you know? And I’m still thinking about the smartest thing to do, to get my job back. But… not the end of the world, I guess. I’ve got my pity internship at EbbCo, I suppose.” You mutter. Sans squints up at you. 

“i really don’t think it’s a pity job-” He tries, and you shake your head. 

“It is. It totally is. Capra had no idea what I could even _do_ at EbbCo. But that’s cool.” You sigh, after a second. “I could use some time where nobody treats me like a zoo attraction, myself. It’ll be nice, if it’s everything you guys say it is.” You say, nodding at Sans. “And… hey, it’ll be fun to work together, right? We could take lunch at the same time and stuff!” You force the enthusiasm into your voice. Sans blinks slowly, then grins. 

“hey, yeah.” 

“Good god.” Undyne laughs, deftly helping you gather all your gifts in one arm. “You guys need to be careful. You can be as annoying and on top of each other as you want around here -”

“Annoying?”

“on top of each other???” You and Sans sputter indignantly. Papyrus and Undyne exchange a very skeptical glance. A heavy pause settles over the room. 

“Anyway.” Undyne finally charges on. “You can’t pull that shit at work. Especially in front of _your_ new boyfriend. He’ll get jealous.” She drawls, nodding at Sans. 

“ok, what the hell-” Undyne clearly knows too much EbbCo gossip, and Sans is having none of it. 

“I talked to Heats!” Undyne laughs.

“does everyone talk to heats all of a sudden???”

“HE’S HARD TO FORGET!” Papyrus chimes in, and Sans groans, frustrated, and settles in to bicker as you roll your eyes and take the flowers into the kitchen. It would be fine, you tell yourself, picking pictures of Uncle Jesse out of the bouquet, and then trying to find a spot for Han Solo. Hm, for once, you might actually beat everyone else to making dinner, you think to yourself, munching on a chocolate from the box Papyrus had given you and searching the fridge. The garage door swings open, and you cringe, bracing yourself for… god, you still keep waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

It’s just Alphys, though, peeking nervously into the kitchen before she spots you. “Oh! H-hey _______. Hey, I heard the bad news, I’m so sorry. I got you something, I don’t know if it’ll help at all, but I figured, you know… can I see your phone?” She’s all business, you can see from the hard look in her eyes (and the fact that she’s only stuttered once talking to you), but she spares a moment to hurry over and hug you tightly with one arm. You smile at her, sliding over your phone, turn back to the fridge, then, realizing something, whirl around.

“Uh, hey, don’t go into my, um, texts, though.” You say, then grit your teeth, and add quietly, “Or, um, my photos?” Your cheeks feel altogether too warm - what was even happening today??? Alphys looks up at you, blinks, then very, very slowly, smirks.

“Ummmmm….” She says, and you groan. Are you really going to talk about this? She’s not working on your phone right now. She’s just staring at you, expectant. You look at her for a second, then spy a bottle of wine in the fridge - damn it, Mettaton keeps opening them and not drinking them! You sigh, very pointedly pull the bottle out, and pour yourself a glass. Alphys coughs quietly. 

“Wine or Dr. Pepper?” You check, looking at her. She beams at you. 

“Dr. Pepper.” She answers, and you sigh and pour her a glass. She leans against the counter, waiting.

“It doesn’t even matter. He… oh, god. He doesn’t understand sexting. I asked him to send me a picture of something hard, day after New Years.” You sigh. She blinks at you. You don’t think you’ve ever seen her happier. “He sent me a math problem.” You grumble, after a long moment, and take a big gulp of your wine. She…

She tries really hard not to laugh. 

“I’m s-sorry. I’m sorry.” She finally sighs, once she’s stopped giggling. “Just-”

“I know. I just… preemptively had all these pictures ready to send. So don’t go in there.” You sigh. Alphys waits for a good two minutes, busily working, before bursting out laughing again as she hands your phone back. 

“W-well, I can fix one of your problems. Kinda. Look.” She holds up a small pin for the aquarium, a style a lot of aquarium workers wear on their shirts. “There’s a little camera in here. Undyne’s going to wear it at work so you can check up on the p-penguins, okay?” You blink, then grab Alphys with both arms, hugging her tightly. 

“You’re amazing. Oh, god, you’re great. Thank you so much. As long as Undyne’s cool with wearing it, I’ll have a lot less to worry about - hey, I know, I know that Undyne does a great job with them, just… it’s been my job for so long.” You say, and release her. “Seriously, Alphys. Thank you.” She grins, blushes, and scuffs her foot on the ground. 

“A-anytime.” She says, and you feel the need to thank her further. 

“Hey, what do you feel like for dinner?” You ask her, and she beams.

___________________

An hour or so later, you’re all slurping ramen - the good stuff, not the reconstituted packets. The mood seems to have improved slightly from everyone bickering to everyone making bawdy jokes (except for, well, Papyrus, who was not catching a single implication of what anyone was saying). Sans keeps fiddling with his phone, though, and after a while, you have to say something about it.

“Okay, baby. That is super annoying.” You grumble. 

“‘s nothing. just capra. he keeps asking questions about what you need tomorrow.” He says, and, then, fixed under your withering glance, actually bothers to take a bite of ramen, slurping up his spoonful of noodles. You swallow, hard. What the fuck was wrong with you, that you couldn’t stop thinking about how hot that was? It actively wasn’t hot! It was the OPPOSITE of hot! Why-

Your cell phone buzzes. 

“whozzat?” Sans demands. You inhale slowly. 

“Dunno. Local area code, but all the people I know are, like, here?” You attempt. Sans’ eyesockets narrow, and his hand slides up your thigh (it had been resting comfortably on your knee), in what was surely a ploy to keep you from investigating further. You think very hard about, in fact, not investigating further. It would be so much more fun if you didn’t. But, instead, you pick up the phone like a total idiot. 

“Tadpole? Is that you?” Paula’s voice is sudden and jarring. You grit your teeth. 

“Hell no.” You say, sitting up very straight. Sans’ eyes narrow even further, hearing your tone, but he moves his hand from your thigh to your back. 

“You know, you don’t need to be such a bitch! I have something important to tell you!” Paula snarls into your phone, and you feel yourself grimace - out of fear or distaste, you’re not sure. 

“Is it about Frisk?” You ask quietly, and there’s a sudden, miserable intake of air, the split second of calm before a siren goes off as Paula inhales, before wailing:

“My baaaaaybeeeee-”

“Shut up.” You snarl, appreciating the way Sans has wrapped his arm around your shoulders when he sees you bristling. You lean against him, taking as much support as he’s willing to give, and say, “Is Frisk okay?”

“Okay? Okaaaay? My baby is held captive by that monster!” Paula whines, her voice tinny and obnoxious in your ear. You grit your teeth.

“Is that all you have to tell us? That Frisk is living with Toriel?”

“What do you mean, “all?” She’s being brainwashed, my baby girl-” 

Your world narrows to an irritable, pulsing point. You hadn’t believed even Paula could go so far. 

“NO!” You hear yourself snap, utterly outraged on behalf of your cousin. “Frisk goes by ‘they,’ and I’m blocking this fucking number!”

“But she, they… It’s my child!” Paula whines into the receiver. 

“They’re not an ’it,’ you asshole!” You snarl, more furious than you can ever remember being, and turn your phone off quickly, tucking it into your pocket before Sans pulls you even closer into his hold, kissing your neck. Okay. Well, so that makes things significantly better, but… it wasn’t as if you could just forget what had just happened and urge him to keep kissing your neck, right?

Right?

RIGHT?

“You okay?” Undyne checks quietly, and you wince. 

“She’s trying to mess with Frisk again. I’ll text Toriel.” You mutter, leaning back against Sans. “I honestly… I don’t know. She said she had news? But… mmm, baby, that is unbelievably distracting.” Sans had begun giving you tiny kisses along the hairline of the side of your neck, almost in spite of his better judgment. Undyne and Alphys look profoundly amused with you, though they’re trying their best to hide it, while Papyrus is just sitting there, brow furrowed. 

“I DON’T UNDERSTAND WHY ANYONE WOULD CALL FRISK ANYTHING THEY DON’T WANT TO BE CALLED?” He finally utters. This is serious enough for Sans to stop misbehaving and speak up. 

“uh, sometimes… humans aren’t that cool, bro. not with people who are different. not everyone’s like _______.” He mutters, and you can feel him tensing, fighting not to pull you totally flush against him once again. He’s got, kind of, a good point. 

“People like Frisk’s birth mom just care about, I don’t know, Paps. Not being embarrassed.” You mutter. “And just about everything that’s new or exciting or different or just not what they’re used to, it embarasses them. Like… I don’t know, people are embarrassed by me because I don't look like they think a human should look.” You explain, and Papyrus frowns deeply. 

“WELL, THAT’S SILLY!” He finally proclaims, and Sans nods. 

“yeah, bro. sometimes humans who aren’t ______ can really suck.” Sans sighs, and hugs you tightly once again. Papyrus hesitates for a second, then proposes, 

“WELL, LET’S WATCH A MOVIE ABOUT GOOD HUMANS BEFORE BED TONIGHT! AND PLAY SOMETHING NICE LIKE…”

“MarioKart!” Alphys interjects hopefully. This sounds fine by you. 

...But much later, when you’re in bed, still wrapped in the arms of a very attentive boyfriend, you have to ask;

“Hey, Sans?”

“mmm... again?” He’s sleepy sounding, but he sounds entirely game for whatever you’re about to propose. You laugh quietly, stretching out against him, and shake your head. 

“No, thank you, baby. I’m totally set for, like, the next five minutes or so…” You say, smirking, but eventually your smile falls. “I was just thinking… should I have listened to Paula? She said she had something important to say?” You mutter, and he breathes in softly, then exhales, stirring your hair. 

“you did right. all the same.... we’ll make sure toriel doesn’t let frisk wander too far.” He mutters, invisible lips up against the nape of your neck. 

“Mmm. Okay.” You stretch slowly. “Tomorrow’s Friday, though. Guess we’re gonna actually have a weekend together. EbbCo has weekends, right?” 

“heck yeah.” Sans says, sounding smug all over again, then catches your meaning. “we’ll hang out with tori and frisk. make sure nothin’ happens to ‘em. during the days, at least.”

“Mmm? What’s happening at night?” You yawn. You suspect you know his answer, but you prompt it from him anyway, because it’s nice to see him - or even feel him - in such a cheerful mood. He grins - you can sense it - and presses bony hips against your butt. That’s enough answer for you, you suppose. “Ah. Good.” You sigh, and hitch his arm more comfortably around you, twisting your fingers through his, before closing your eyes. 

“you nervous about work?” He asks the silent room, about five minutes later. You yawn, and nod slowly - you don’t have the ability to lie right now. “it’ll be good, babe. i’ll keep an eye out for you. but… it’s a good place for monsters.” He says softly. 

“I’m not a monster.” You yawn, and he kisses the back of your neck again. 

“it’ll be a good place for you too.” 

You sincerely hope he’s right.


	69. In Which Sans Sends More Math Problems

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay! So new policy, starting after today: If there is sexual content in a chapter (like there is in this chapter!) I will write "Sexual Content Warning" in a note after the end of a chapter. That way, if it's something you need/want to avoid, you can do so by pressing Ctrl + F and searching "Sexual Content Warning"  
> But we're not doing that in this chapter, you're just getting spoiled right in this note that there's skele frick frack (also because it's chapter 69 and clearly this ended up being twice as long as a normal chapter so I could get that hilarious smut in chapter 69 because i have the mental maturity of a small ant.)
> 
> FANART! (and they are really great this time let me tell u) 
> 
>  
> 
> [I am so happy about this one of the AWKWARD MOAN SCENE](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140827976571/artanddetermination-the-single-most-amazing)
> 
>  
> 
> [this one's just ridiculous](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140836990351/submitted-by-asrielis-the-very-wonderful-and)
> 
>  
> 
> [The world's gonna eat u whole one day](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140877209181/punnyland)
> 
>  
> 
> [souls are serious business](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140992943391/i-was-rereading-my-favorite-part-and-the-moment)
> 
>  
> 
> [lots of great art feat l. pants](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140994199661/colorfulexhaustion-is-it-finally-time-to-dump)
> 
>  
> 
> [DAMN MOD back at it again with the dank snas](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/140949107191/mod2amaryllis-shit-totalskeletontrash-you-need)

You wake up early the next morning, nerves for your first day at work twisting in your chest. It’s way too early, you could sleep for another few hours, but you suddenly need to move, stretch your legs a little, and talk yourself down. You grimace slightly - Sans isn’t clinging to you, the way he’s been these past few weeks, but escape from bed without waking him is still tricky. You manage it, though, barely rousing more than a grumble from him, and head for the bathroom, cranking up the hot water in the shower and sliding inside a second later. 

You were still discovering some highly weird things about your post-skarm life - like the fact that you had to take a toothbrush to the nooks and crannies between your carpals to feel fully clean. This was something Sans never seemed to be concerned with, but Sans was a little (okay, kind of a lot) lax with what he felt necessary to do to feel clean. Ugh, he probably had a point - he was just smooth bone, and he had different concerns than you as a result (“human body has a hundred trillion cells in it, but only like one tenth are human. rest are all bacteria and viruses and junk. you’re way grosser than me, babe.” He’d said with a smirk, and worse, you’d looked it up on your phone and discovered he was right, that asshole). He seemed to follow you into the shower strictly for the entertainment value - damn it, you needed to be less entertaining, if only for the sake of your boyfriend’s cleanliness, you thought primly.

Well, that, and... you’d discovered last night that there was certainly something to be said for allowing him to get all worked up before he got his way - not that he was ever an unenthusiastic lover, but there was certainly value in delayed gratification. He’d clearly felt every single day of the weeks where neither of you had been in the right place to have sex. The way he’d kissed you the second the bedroom door shut last night, already working on the button on your jeans, the way he’d been so insistent on getting you to moan for him, a spark in his eyes like there was something there, almost like a joke, something that you weren’t quite getting (and, due to Sans’ pact with Undyne to never mention the moaning incident on the couch, you never _would_ end up understanding)...

Speaking of which;

“hey, room for one more?” His low voice startles you enough to make you jump, then glare at the curtains that are preventing you from being able to see him. You think about this for a second. 

“Nope.” You decide, grinning to yourself. 

“nope?” He repeats, sounding surprised.

“Nope. If I let you in here, I’m pretty sure I’m going to get dirty all over again.” You say sweetly. 

“dirty’s not bad.” He points out, and you let out a laugh before managing to pull your serious face back on. 

“I must not have met your expectations last night, if you’re trying this hard to seduce me right now.” You say mournfully, and he immediately says, 

“woah, woah, let’s not get carried away here-”

“I’m not hearing a ‘no.’” You remark, and he groans. 

“you’re messing with me. ‘s not fair. you _know_ how good you were last night -”

“And I also _know_ that if I let you join me in the shower right now, it’s all I’ll be able to think about for the next few hours, and I need to come off like I’m not a total airhead today.”

“sorry, stopped listening after ‘i need to come-’”

“Out!” You laugh, and he grumbles, nudges the curtains aside, and leans underneath the spray of the shower to kiss you sweetly (sweet enough to almost make you regret putting him off).

“k. morning, love.” He yawns, sliding the shower curtain back shut, and your heart stutters slightly at the new term of endearment. Since he can’t see you, you allow a big, huge, besotted smile to cross your face, hugging yourself slightly - god, you had landed yourself one of the most wonderful men in the universe. Why were you not inviting him into the shower again??

Stepping out, toweling yourself off, you spot your phone on the bathroom counter and nod to yourself. Oh, right. 

You had top secret plans for today.  
_____________________

Undyne and Papyrus have already left for their respective jobs by the time Sans shoves the armoire out of the way and the two of you make your way downstairs. Alphys is sitting at the kitchen island on a stool, reading the newspaper and trying to keep her tail out of Ghost’s reach - he kept swatting at it, pacing around the bottom of her chair like a shark circling shipwreck. 

“Bad kitty!” You scold, bending over to boop him on the nose. Ghost skitters away, and you lean up to smile at Alphys. “Morning!” 

“H-hey! Morning! You didn’t need to scare him off, he was just p-playing!” Alphys laughs, and you roll your eyes. 

“Mm, you wouldn’t say that if he actually got your tail, his claws are sharp!”

“they are.” Sans says ruefully. “god, getting him off of you on christmas was a nightmare.” 

“I can’t imagine. I mean, I’ve still got the scars.” You gesture on your collarbone, where one of his paws had dug into your flesh, the night your desperate attempt to save him had nearly gotten the both of you killed. 

“i like to think of them as, uh, bravery tattoos.” Sans says with a grin, pouring you a cup of coffee without needing to be asked, then holding the carafe out for Alphys with a raised browbone. She thinks about it, nods, and holds her mug out, and Sans tops her off before pouring the rest into his own mug. 

“Um, Undyne made you breakfast. And she, heh, she packed you a lunch. Um, just ________. Well, she made you both breakfast, she knows you don’t eat lunch though, Sans, it’s not that she likes ________ more, she just-”

“Dude, she totally likes me more.” You scoff, and glance around, before spotting breakfast; blueberry muffins still in the tray on the counter. “She’s amazing.” You sigh, grabbing one, and cut another in half and put it on a saucer before passing it to Sans. He eyes it, sighs, and takes a bite that seems more dutiful than enthusiastic - you don’t care as long as he’s eating. 

“W-well, yeah, okay, I mean, she _is_ asking you to be her Maid of Honor, so-” Alphys suddenly stops talking, and claps both hands to her mouth. “Oh no!” She squeaks, but it’s too late, and you’re grinning like you’ve never grinned before. 

“Oh my god is she really?!”

“O-oh my g-god it w-was s-s-supposed to b-b-be a surprise!” Alphys stammers violently, flushed all over. “S-stupid, Alphys! S-STUPID!” She begins to rock back and forth in her chair, clearly distressed far beyond what you’d expected - she begins gulping for breath, looking quite panicked. Your grin falls away instantly as she stands up and grips the counter edge, hard, still squeaking “STUPID!” over and over. Before you can think of what to do, Sans is out of his chair and next to her, his hand on her back.

“hey. hey. you’re ok. ‘s no big deal. nobody’s mad.” His voice is soft and soothing. “c’mon. c’mon, deep breaths, okay? let’s count back from ten.” He doesn’t need to elaborate further - this is a procedure that they both seem to be quite familiar with. 

“T-t-t-ten!” Alphys finally gasps, taking a pained breath and then holding it. 

“good, okay, now let it out. slow.” Sans guides patiently, his entire attention focused on Alphys.

“N-nine…” She manages, sounding a little calmer. Sans smiles gently. 

“good. good job. you’re doing great.” He murmurs, and begins rubbing her back in small circles. You recognize the panic attack for what it is, now, and wordlessly begin fixing Alphys a glass of water, wondering if she has any medication for this. Probably not. Monsters aren’t huge on pills, but - “babe, she’s got herbs.” Sans calls quietly. “cabinet with the tea bags, should be a bunch of packets marked alphys’ calm tea. ‘s good, alph, you’re doing great.” He turns his attention back to her for a minute while you search, then looks back up, “just dump a packet in the glass, doesn’t need to be hot.” He instructs. You do so, hurrying it over, and stir it quickly with the spoon you’d been planning on using for your coffee. The water turns a light orange color, and the scent of citrus, maybe something floral, rises from it. Sans waits for Alphys to make it all the way down to “one” before he pushes the glass of calm tea in front of her. “drink it slow.” He reminds her, and she nods, taking a small sip, then another, slowly draining the glass. 

“how you feelin’?” He asks, maybe a minute later. “you did really great, alph.”

“I-I’m… okay. Feeling stupid.” She mumbles, looking down at the glass. You can’t help it. You’re not sure how welcome your presence is right now, but you can’t just stand idly by, so you reach across the counter, covering one of her hands with your own. 

“Hey, don’t. Weddings are really stressful.” You say quietly. “But you’re fine, sweetie. You know nobody’ll be upset with you for that. Undyne would never be mad that you let the cat out of the bag a little early.” You reassure her, and Sans nods. 

“yeah, alph, ‘s cool. undyne will just be stoked _______ knows.”

“W-we were gonna ask you all special though.” Alphys mutters, and you grin in spite of yourself.

“You couldn’t find a way to make me feel more honored than I do right now. God, I’ve never been in a wedding! I’ve never even seen a monster wedding! I’m so excited to be there for you guys, no matter what. I don’t need anything special to make that be true.” You say, and Alphys slumps and gives you a tired looking smile. 

“Thank you.” She murmurs, and takes another long, deep breath, before nodding at the clock. “You guys need to get going.”

“you sure? we can stay. or i can-”

“No. I’m fine. J-just a little…” She sighs again, and you urge, 

“Hey, text one of us, okay, if you’re not feeling well? We can be back really really fast.” You remind her, and she lets out a soft chuckle. 

“I know. Thanks, ______. Sans. L-love you guys. ______, don’t forget your lunch, it’s in the f-fridge!” She urges, and you hurry over to grab it, smiling at the brown paper bag it’s packed in, before turning to Sans. 

“Okay, babe, you want to do the honors?” 

“yeah. been making the door a little ways out so capra doesn’t see. bye, alphys. my phone’s on, don’t forget.” He says, and traces a doorway in the air. You step through first, into the foggy air and pine woods at the base of Mt. Ebott. Off in the distance, you can see the integrated structure of EbbCo, emerging seamlessly from the incline of the mountainside. Sans comes through a second later, and you smile at Spot’s chirping greeting before the door winks out of existence. 

“Is she gonna be okay?” You check, as soon as Alphys is out of earshot. Sans sighs and nods. 

“yeah. she gets over ‘em pretty fast these days. used to happen a lot more often, but… things are better up here.” He says, and then looks you over. “she’ll be fine, promise. are _you_ ready, though?” 

“Are people going to call me a ‘dirty monster-fucking cunt’ in there?” You mutter dryly, and he growls quietly, his eye flashing for a second. 

“someone called you that, at the aquarium?” He hisses, and you bark out a morose laugh. 

“I didn’t let you come down there to see the picket line they made at the entrance for a reason. You’d have sent them all to the void for good, and I didn’t want to wait for you to get out of jail.” You sigh, and lean forward to kiss him. He responds to the gesture hungrily, needily, clearly reacting to the thought of what you must have been through by convincing himself that you’re still alive, still okay, more or less. “Hey. I’ll be fine here though, right?” You murmur, once you’ve pulled away (and calmed yourself down - he had certainly not gotten _worse_ at kissing since you’d first met him) and he nods. 

“yeah. capra’s so excited to have you here.” He says, then looks up at you and smiles, blushing just a tiny bit. “me too.” He says quietly, and you sigh, just… loving this man. 

“I’m glad you’re excited.” You say with a quick smile. “And I’m glad we’ll be working close to each other. Babe, you’re sure this is good for me to wear to work, though? You’re certain this isn’t too casual?” You step back, holding your arms out; you’re wearing gray jeans, soft black boots, and a scoop neck black cashmere sweater Mettaton had given you for Christmas - it’s wonderfully soft, but it’s cut to reveal the tops of both shoulders, so your collarbones (and your ‘bravery tattoos’) and your bra strap peeking out is unavoidable. Sans snorts, and glances down at himself pointedly - black converse sneakers, basketball shorts, blue hoodie - the usual Sans outfit. 

“you look too nice, honestly. it’s super casual in there unless you’re on the eighth floor with capra.” He says, and you pretend not to notice the lights of his eyes lingering a bit too long on your breasts as he looks you over once more. So even Alphys’ panic attack hadn’t managed to shift his focus from you entirely, you note. 

Good. 

\-------------------------------------

“________! Sans! There you are, I’ve been waiting - oh, you’re technically early, aren’t you.” Capra is waiting at reception again to greet you, just as he had with Sans. Behind him, Gloria, the monster receptionist, waves cheerfully at the both of you. He looks a little caught off guard that you’re there on time, and he narrows his eyes slightly at Sans. “All of a sudden, he’s punctual.” He drawls, and then looks back at you, extending his hand once more. “I’m so glad you decided to join us, _______. I know that this is the start of a very, very good thing.” 

“Oh, um, thanks so much, Peter. I’m really happy to be here too, while things are getting sorted out back at work.” You say quietly, shaking his hand, and his grin grows wider. 

“Well, who knows what’ll happen? I suspect that you’ll find that the aquarium isn’t all that interesting, by the time your internship is done.” He laughs, those piercing blue eyes studying yours. It’s funny, you’d expect such a perfectly groomed man to have soft, smooth hands, but you can feel rough, calloused skin against the sensitive bones of your right hand. These are hands that have actually done real work, you note, and file that thought away for later. Capra must be thinking along similar lines, because he doesn’t release your hand right away, until Sans pointedly clears his throat. “Right.” Capra straightens up, turning to your boyfriend. “Well, I’ve got some bad news for both of you, I’m afraid.”

“whazzat?” Sans sounds on guard.

“Sans - King Asgore reaffirmed his stance last night that humans aren’t allowed to employ monsters in a magical capacity, not until a whole list of ransom demands are met. And I still can’t check out the Core myself, not until Asgore’s confident I’m not going to do anything evil with the tech.” 

“s’not just tech, it’s magic too, bud.” 

“Yeah, I know.” Capra sighs. “Still. I sent a runner this morning, asking if I could have a monster go in and videotape the core, since technically monsters are legally required to have free access to all of the underground. He said that he would permit still photography only. So… buddy, I’ve got a mission for you.” He says, giving Sans a blinding grin. Sans blinks. 

“oh. uh. you want me to take pictures of the core.” He says, then sighs. “wanted to be here on site with ______ on her first day. just in case.” 

“Hey. I’ll be fine.” You say softly, reflexively, then realize it might have been some sort of ploy too late. Capra’s already beaming at the both of you. 

“You can always teleport back if there’s any trouble-”

“it’s not teleporting, did you even listen yesterday?” 

“Whatever. Can you do it?” He asks, then meets Sans’ eyes quite seriously. “Look, I know you don’t relish the idea of being underground. Take as long as you need? Breaks, et cetera? I just… we’re not going to give up now! I know this can be done, because you already did it once!” He says, his eyes sparking, the passion clear in his voice. “If I could just wrap my mind around the basic concept behind your Core, I could find out where we’re failing and fix it. I know we can do this, together. Two races, one earth. This is for everyone.” He says, and Sans sighs. 

“yeah, yeah. what’s the bad news for _______?” 

“Oh!” Capra turns to you and grimaces. “So, HR was really not pleased for me when I filled out all the forms for your handsome gentleman companion in advance, yes?” He drawls, and you try to hide a smile and fail. “So I am afraid, my dear _______, that your first day at EbbCo is going to, how should I put this, suck. So, today you’re going to be shown to your new office, and you will then break it in with a movie day.” He says, then winks at you. “Don’t worry. I had one of the interns get you a huge bucket of movie theater popcorn and some M&Ms. Just try not to get butter on the W-4s, okay?” 

“Peter.” You cross your arms. “You can’t just have interns go out to get me stuff. _I’m_ supposed to be an intern.” 

“You can go out and get the next intern snacks.” He says lazily. 

“Do all the interns have offices?” You demand. 

“All the interns whose parents founded the damn company.” Capra replies. “Look, if it makes you feel any better, it’s your mom and dad’s joint office on the fourth floor, nobody’s really even touched the place since the accident because nobody had any idea where to start on figuring out what was personal versus company possessions, and the entire floor voted unanimously to give it to you and some of ‘em even stayed late cleaning and dusting, so you’d be hurting some major feelings if you turned it down.”

“O-oh.” You stammer, swallow, then nod. “Uh… okay, then. I guess. If that’s really how it’s gotta be.” 

“It is.” Capra looks smug - well, he always looks smug, but he looks smugger than usual. “Sans, bud, let me grab you a camera. Asgore’s people said a _film_ camera for pics, no digital, can you believe that shit?” He barks out a laugh. “Gloria, will you show ______ up to her office? Kid, make sure you take an hour for lunch today, okay? I’d tell you to check out the cafeteria, but…” He looks at your packed paper bag and grins. “Looks like you came prepared.” He says, and tips you a quick wave before saying, “Sans, media supplies is on LL2, let me show you what I’m thinking of.”

“see ya later, babe. have fun.” Sans murmurs dryly. 

“You too. Stay safe.” You say, and sigh when the elevator doors shut behind Sans and Capra, leaving you with Gloria (and the steady flow of interested looking monsters and humans filtering into the building).

“Betsy, will you cover front for me?” Gloria says into her headset (somehow), and then signs a smile at you - you beam when you recognize the gesture. “Sorry about Mr. Capra, sweetie, he’s just ...like that. Let me show you to your office!” She sounds quite cheerful. 

\---------------------------

Capra’s right. Your first day could have definitely been planned to be more interesting. 

Not that it was awful. Far from it. When you stepped out the elevator, you were greeted, almost instantly, by a floor of, frankly, delighted looking employees. The humans, particularly the older ones, were grinning from ear to ear. One or two were even wiping their eyes surreptitiously - they looked like might have been around for the long haul, since your parents had started EbbCo. Even the younger humans looked slightly awestruck - you figure out why almost immediately, when you spot the large, stately portraits of your mother and father, hung in prominant positions on the wall of the office, the EbbCo logo in between them. 

If the humans were excited, though, the monsters were another story. There’s about forty people on this floor, it seems, and a good fifteen of them are monsters. You think you’ve seen a few of them before, at Grillby’s or in the Palace market, but now, seeing them up close, you can see the undisguised affection on every single face. After all, to them, you weren’t just the daughter of EbbCo’s beloved founders. You were also the girl who had gone on national TV to stick up for the monsters. The girl who had nearly died because of her friends. The girl who had been harassed for her arm for the past few weeks, but had refused to buckle, to say anything even close to bad about monsters, who had again and again showed that human-monster friendship was more than a pipedream for the future. Plus, you were dating Sans, and Sans, it turned out, truly did know just about everyone. 

After the whirlwind introductions, the stately, nearly ceremonial offering of the key to your parents’ old office, the pictures being snapped as you stepped inside for the first time… suddenly, the crowd dispersed. Everyone had things they needed to do, after all, and as charmed as they were that you were here, work didn’t stop just because the last scion of EbbCo had returned to take her rightful place.

So… you close the door to your new office, and take the place in. 

As usual, when it came to your parents, natural light had been prioritized - one wall of the office is made entirely of floor to ceiling windows. The other three are bookshelves, overstuffed by a massive number of tomes - you recognize some of them, but others are too old and faded to even read the title on the spine. You pull one off a shelf at random, and it creaks open, revealing ancient, handwritten pages - was that Latin? - that remind you inexorably of the bestiary that Asgore had given you for Christmas. Interesting. You could spend ages just sorting through the books in here, you realize, but there’s so much more to see!

There are pictures of - unsurprisingly - you on the walls, in various stages of childhood, looking so happy and carefree. One of your mom and dad dancing on their wedding night - Paula, looking much younger, much prettier, and much happier, is beaming in the background, which makes your stomach twist. On the desk, there’s some stress relief knickknacks, a shiny new nameplate that’s been made (overnight!) just for you, a Captain Planet action figure that must have belonged to one of your parents, the promised movie theater snacks (Capra really hadn’t been kidding) - and a pile of paperwork and DVDs, next to a sleek new computer that must have just been brought in for you. Guiltily, you stop poking around and decide that you should probably do what you’re being paid to do today. 

Filling out the paperwork takes no time at all. You’ve guided new hires through these forms at the aquarium so many times that completing them yourself is more muscle memory than actual thought. Fifteen minutes later, you have a whole binder of new hire packets completed, and a rather intimidating pile of DVDs you have to at least pretend to watch. 

Picking up the one that’s guaranteed to have been made within the last year - “Species Relations: A Guide to a Pleasant Workplace For You and Your New Colleagues,” you pop the disc in the CD drive, then settle in for the long haul, your eyes beginning to glaze over before the jazzy intro song has even concluded. 

You’ve managed to make it through one and a half videos when your phone buzzes. 

sans (11:42): how’s movie day?

You perk up immediately. You’d figured he wouldn’t have reception, being that far underground! But right. Monster phones. Thank you, Alphys, for making this day potentially much more interesting!

You: Fine so far. Everyone’s really nice. How’s the core?

sans: weird. lonely. just me down here. 

You: Just me in here. ;)

Brilliantly executed winking smiley, ________. 

sans: good. you can keep me company. 

You: Hm. I don’t know. This sexual harassment video is pretty riveting. 

sans: oh yeah? what are you learning?

You: Not to sexually harass.

sans: go figure.

You: Yeah, I could get in a lot of trouble for talking, for example, about what we did last night.

Sans has been texting you back right away this whole time, but now, there is a _spectacularly_ satisfying pause. You can just imagine him, scrambling for something to say. 

You: Awfully quiet all of a sudden. 

sans: ...well, now i’m thinking about last night. 

You: I’m not sure I ever stopped thinking about last night. 

Your cheeks feel quite warm - you’d only ever been brave enough to do anything like this once before with anyone but Sans, and you certainly hadn’t been the initiator that time. But now, even in spite of your earlier spectacular failed attempt (the “Math Problem Incident”), you couldn’t help but think that things were going much more smoothly. 

sans: uh, what in particular were you thinking about?

It’s your turn to let him stew on that question for a while. 

You: Shouldn’t you be working?

sans: i’ve been sidetracked by a fascinating discovery. 

You: Hm. 

You: Well. 

You: I was definitely thinking about how amazing it felt to have all of you inside me again at last. It took you like… ten seconds from getting the door blocked off to having that entire huge cock in me. Normally, I don’t think I would have been ready for you, but you’d been teasing me so much all afternoon and night, and I couldn’t believe how much I needed you. God, I would have done anything to have you filling me. I came so fast. Fuck, I love it so much when you’re that hard for me.

You type it out, and think very, very hard about whether or not you’re going to press “send,” crossing your legs absently, then quickly close your eyes, and send it off before you can regret it. 

Three minutes creep by, where you try very, very hard to pay attention to the sexual harassment video (which is patiently explaining that you most certainly should not do anything like you’re doing right now). 

sans: goddamn it.

You: Yes?

sans: fuck, i am just standing here, on r2 in hotland, all by myself, with the biggest goddamn bone in my shorts. 

You grin to yourself, then bite your lip.

You: You know, this is why you shouldn’t wear basketball shorts everywhere. They leave nothing to the imagination.

sans: this normally isn’t a problem! i stop thinking about it, it goes away! it’s magic!

You: So stop thinking about it?

sans: heh. don’t think that’s possible after that text. goddamn. 

You try very, very hard not to feel like the smuggest girlfriend of all time. You are wildly unsuccessful. 

You: My poor baby. 

sans: want to know what i’m thinking about?

Well, obviously, yes, you very much want to know that. He doesn’t wait for your answer. 

sans: thinkin about how you came around me over and over again. remember when i licked the inside of your arm and then i bit your wrist and you just lost it and all you could do was whisper my name and “more”

You take in a slow breath. Yup. You do remember that. Oh, god, you remember that quite vividly. You’re thinking about this, shifting uneasily in your seat, your nipples altogether too hard.

sans: baby, how about when we came together that first time, how you had to bite my collarbone to stop from screaming. the way every part of your body moves like it cant get enough of me. its like were built for eachother. 

He’s normally a (surprisingly) grammatically exact texter. The fact that this skill seems to be fading from his repertoire makes you wonder, suddenly, if he might not be using his right hand to type any longer. Or where his right hand might be instead. Suddenly, it’s very, very hard to catch your breath, as you sit there, in this office, imagining him, somewhere in the underground, his phone in one hand, his other hand urgently working himself-

You: Fuck I planned this very poorly. 

sans: hm?

You: I wanted to tease you until dinner.

sans: thats not vry nice

You glance at the clock. 11:57. Close enough.

You: Take your lunch right now. Meet me in the kitchen at home. 

You don’t wait for his response. You just stand up, slice a hole in the space in front of you, and step through into your house. 

He’s already there, waiting for you, shorts pushed down and erection out, furiously hard and glowing very faintly in the sunlight. “Fuck, I love you.” You gasp, as he closes the distance, pushing you back on the kitchen table, and you just barely remember to close the doorway behind you before he’s over you, hands mauling your breasts through your sweater as his tongue slides into your mouth. You wriggle out of the sweater quickly - the last thing you want is for it to get hot and sticky - and toss it onto the kitchen island, which will probably be safe from the fallout. He grins against your lips, and eases away to breathe in your ear,

“i love you so much. fuck. you are - mmmf -” (your hand has wrapped tight around him) “goddamnit, you are _perfect._ ” He slides your jeans and panties off in one motion- when had he even undone the button or fly? How are your shoes already off? You wrack your brain for a second, then give up, succumbing entirely as he slips a (suspiciously thick feeling) finger inside of you, rubbing you expertly. God, he knows all your spots, every single place that makes you moan or gasp or scream, and he uses them! You fumble with one hand to open his hoodie, zipping it down so you can at least see his ribs, and let out a soft whimper as he presses another finger inside of you. He’s watching your skeletal hand pump him, something he’s never seen in daylight, his head craned unnaturally far in order to get the best view. You do your best to oblige, giving him long, showy strokes that have him groaning, his tongue lolling out of his mouth between sharp canines, and you realize that all of this is new, that you’ve never done this while either of you could see each other clearly, and that you’re obviously both loving it. 

“Sans…” You hear yourself moan needily, and he grunts, snapping back to attention, the lights of his eyes boring into yours. 

“so beautiful.” He whispers, carefully removing his fingers. You reluctantly pull your own hand away, and he leans over you, but… the kitchen table height is weird, maybe, or the angle is wrong, or something - he grunts with frustration, and you’re about to suggest that you move, or (god forbid) you actually get to be on top this time, but then he grunts, “can i use magic?” and you nod your head quickly, unsure what that’ll entail.

He makes a quick gesture, and you feel yourself rise up in the air - it’s like you’ve been pulled upwards, like a thousand helium balloons have been tied around your soul. Right. He’d told you about this, this special gift of his, the gravity magic. It’s not in the least uncomfortable, but you get the sense that it could be, very, very easily, if he chose to make you feel leaden, not buoyant. You let out a quiet, delighted giggle, and the animal desire falls from his face like it’s a mask that’s been pulled off, and he looks at you with such pure _love_ that you simply have to lean up and kiss him again. You’re still kissing him as he pushes inside you, that space inside of you that had begun to ache for want of him suddenly, fully satisfied - for a second or two, anyway, and then you need more, and more, and more still. 

It takes a remarkable amount of trust, being like this - you can’t push back against anything, can’t change your position, correct for anything. You’re just floating, just above the kitchen table, and he’s standing by the side, his arms moving to wrap around you, supporting you in an embrace like you’ve never felt before, since you’re weightless within his arms. For a moment or two, you struggle with the idea, and then, suddenly, it all registers with you, and you can barely contain your pleasure. “I love you, I love you, I - fuck, Sans!” You keep gasping, as he moans, a low rumble in his chest, keeping up a hard and urgent rhythm. It doesn’t take long for either of you, after all that. He begins to pick up speed, whispering your name in your ear as he bends over you, and then, his eyes screwed shut, you feel him swell and that charged magic between your legs amplifies to a point you can no longer bear - you grip him with your arms and legs and succumb to one of the most powerful orgasms you’ve ever felt. The look on his face and the wild feeling of his magic, building to a nearly unbelievable crescendo inside of you, tells you that you’re not alone. 

“_______. oh god.” He finally shudders, and pulls out of you reluctantly, then runs a hand through your (thankfully, not too sweaty) hair. “you are the most amazing thing to ever happen.” He whispers. “love you so much. love you forever.” He suddenly recalls the position he has you in, lets out a hoarse, tired laugh, and eases you back down onto the table. 

“Me too.” You pant, and let out a slightly hysterical giggle. “Oh god. How much time do we have?” 

“half hour.” He sighs, helping you sit up. “we’re good.”

“Mmm.” It’s barely enough time to get yourself looking half presentable and eat whatever Undyne had packed for your lunch, but the two of you manage, somehow, to get yourselves back in order, even though your progress is very nearly interrupted twice when a stolen kiss becomes a bit too amorous. Luckily, you remember each time that things need doing - for example, the table needs to be sprayed and cleaned so you might, in theory, maybe(!) be able to look your friends in the eye the next time you all have a meal together. Your lunch ends up being back at the office - right, of course, you hadn’t thought to grab it - so you commandeer one last kiss, lingering as long as you dare, and run your fingers over his jaw. “Okay. Gotta go back. I’ll see you tonight, babe. Be good.” He lets out a hoarse laugh at that request, and nuzzles your neck one last time. 

“i love you.” 

“I love you too. So much.” You whisper, give him an adoring glance, and make a doorway back to your office, before you can convince yourself to play hooky from your very first day and follow him back to Hotland. 

Closing the door into your dark office, you sigh, then freeze, realizing suddenly that the blinds are drawn, and that you hadn’t left them that way. 

The high backed computer chair swivels slowly to face you. Capra’s perched in it, looking thrilled at his dramatic reveal. 

“Oh, _______.” He says. “We need to talk.”


	70. In Which Capra Doesn't Do Anything Incredibly Uncomfortable

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this time I really will come back and do fanart at the beginning.  
> You rascals.   
> Seriously, once I get back from the pub I'll fix this.

You stare, astonished, at Capra’s display. He steeples his hands, looking up at you, then sighs and leans back in your chair. “Okay. Be honest. Was that too much?” He demands. You blink, then figure out what he’s asking. Letting out a slow breath, you nod.

“It was… a little dramatic.” You say diplomatically. He sighs. 

“You’re no fun.” He mutters, and stands up. “You grab lunch?” 

“I, um, just finished. Er. I just finished my lunch break, I mean.” You say, distractedly reaching around him to open the blinds. With the light pouring back into the office, he looks much less menacing.

“Yep, not what I asked. Your bag lunch was still on your desk.” He drawls, and there’s a slight question in his voice that you just refuse to acknowledge right now.

“Had to check on something at home.” You say with a slow shrug, channeling Sans at his least tractable. 

“So, you haven’t had lunch.” Capra concludes. “C’mon, let’s grab a bite. I’m thinking seafood, how about you? You wanna hit Narcissus?” You open your mouth slowly to protest - a) it’s a staggeringly expensive restaurant, and b) you’re not sure how you feel about, really, anything that’s happening right now. “Hey, don’t worry, it’s on me. It’s normal to take interns out to lunch.” He drawls, and you sigh, suspecting that he’s right about at least this one thing. Still, seeing your reluctance, he clears his throat. “Go on, tell my boyf- sorry, _your_ boyfriend where we’re going.” He says, giving you a positively obnoxious grin. You roll your eyes.

“I really hope you’re not doing like, ‘no-homo’ jokes. Like, if the punchline here is that it would be hilarious for you to be dating a man… or a monster… you should probably watch some of these videos.” You point out, and he arches an eyebrow.

“Rest assured, kiddo, my appetites are... varied.” He says, and the look on his face is enough to make you immediately regret asking the question. “Hey, you asked.” He points out with a graceful shrug (one that reminds you inexorably of Lawyerpants - oh god, those two should not meet), and you groan. 

“I suppose I did.” You mutter, and pick up your phone, sending a text quickly. 

You: Capra’s taking me to lunch. 

sans: we just had lunch ;) 

You blink. You’d kinda expected him to freak out at the mere thought, but he was just responding with a… winky smiley face.

You: That ...wasn’t technically lunch. 

sans: well, we just went on break?

You: Apparently my time is not so valuably spent on videos about sexual harassment that I can’t be borrowed for an extra lunch.

sans: the ironic thing is that you actually need to watch those videos. you need them more than anyone else at ebbco. if i showed h.r. those texts...

Goddamn it. You bite your lip so you won’t laugh in front of Capra, and take a second to collect yourself. 

You: I mean, I’m pretty sure we’d both get in trouble. And… any advice? I mean, should I try to weasel out of it?

There’s a pause in Sans’ texting, which you hope means that he’s actually thinking about it right now. Capra hums patiently, grabbing a handful of popcorn and watching you as you type.

sans: do it. i wanna know what he’s up to. and send him to the void if he tries anything. 

You: Great advice. Really solid. 

sans: sorry, still in a great mood. too happy to even get jealous. fuck, i’m sorry, that was just   
sans: so.  
sans: fucking.

Okay, you have an idea where these texts are going. You cut him off quickly. 

You: Ok. I’m going to flirt with you again once our boss stops staring at me, k?

sans: heh oops is he right there? tell him i say hi- 

Nope, you are not going to facilitate your boyfriend’s office romance. Hell no. You groan, roll your eyes, and slip your phone back in your pocket. 

“Well?” Capra eats his last kernel of popcorn and brushes his hands together brusquely. You sigh. 

“Sans says hi. Yeah, let’s go get lunch.” Capra’s eyes spark triumphantly. 

“Tell him that I say hi back and that I miss him alread-”

“Okay, you know, you can text him that yourself…” You laugh, and nod at the door. “Shall we?” Capra nods and straightens his suit jacket on his shoulders, and you bend down to tie a forgotten bootlace, the only remaining indication that you’d been spread over the kitchen table like … uh, brunch?... not forty-five minutes ago. Oh fuck, you couldn’t let your mind wander back to that, or your cheeks would begin to warm again, and you’d be forced to pay attention to the lingering feeling of his magic, still in the process of being absorbed into your soul-

“You good?” Capra interrupts this reverie. You nod quickly. “Okay.” He gives you a pointed look. “Well, then, do _you_ want to take us, or should I?” He says deliberately, and very quickly, you shake away the pleasant fog of the last few minutes to see this all from Capra’s perspective, that his new employee, the old friend, the _human_ , had apparently stepped into your office from out of thin air. 

Sans had clearly failed to mention that you could do that. 

“Um. We should take your car.” You say flatly, and the barely concealed, delighted energy in his eyes flags for a second, leaving him looking cold and disappointed, but then he catches himself and grins. 

“Sure. I bet Sans told you all about it. I understand, you wanting to check it out.”

\--------------------------------

Sans had, in fact, not told you all about Capra’s car, because that would be mildly ridiculous (well, maybe he would have, if you’d been having a better time at the aquarium). That’s okay. It’s probably for the best, because Capra tells you all about it, the entire fifteen minute drive to Narcissus. 

“So I traded the solar prototype for the self driving engine that those nerds were working on -” He might be talking about Google, or Apple? Yahoo? You’d lost track, “and used that software plus my next generation of paneling - are you following? You don’t look like you’re following.” The car’s driving itself, and Capra is fully focused on you, not even looking at the road, which is profoundly distracting. 

“You swapped lots of tech and you made yourself a Frankencar.” 

“Frankencar’s monster, technically, Frankencar would have been the scientist-”

“Oh my god.” You groan, deadpan, and he flashes his grin at you again. 

“Anyway, yes, that’s the very reductive gist. Total fuel efficiency, I can go a thousand miles in this baby on a sunny day, and it drives itself. The future’s here, _________. If I could mass market these things so they cost a few hundred thousand less to make…” He sighs, and then perks up as the car pulls into the parking lot of the seaside restaurant. “Here we go.” He glances at you. “Don’t worry. You’re not underdressed.” Well, you weren’t worried until he’d said that! 

When you walk in at his side, you’re mildly horrified to be led to a private room, which is probably more suited for a romantic meal than a business one. You’re further horrified when Capra closes the door to the room behind him, after gesturing to the waiter that, yes, you will be ordering a bottle of wine (you’ve never imagined drinking while at work before, much less at lunch!). You need to keep your wits very much about you, you think, palming your cellphone - just in case you need Sans. 

Still, it’s not until the first course arrives (he’s ordered the four course tasting menu for both of you, because of course he has) that he leans forward and says, “Okay. Enough bullshitting. You can do magic.” 

“Um…”

“Hey. Do I come off as stupid?” He takes a sip of bisque, then groans. “Holy shit, have you tried this yet? Try it. Then answer.” You take a sip, thinking. No. He comes off as very many things, but stupid is not on that list. “Well?” He drawls. 

“It’s good!” You say with a wide smile. He rolls his eyes, and you take a deep breath. “No. You’re not stupid. And… Yes. I can do magic.” You don’t think there’s any way of avoiding that one. 

Those piercing blue eyes linger, covetously, on your skeletal arm. “I mean, I suppose on some level it should have been obvious. That arm isn’t smoke and mirrors, after all. That’s real magic.” He mutters, and you wince. 

“That’s not _my_ magic, though.” You say, wanting, for some reason, to be absolved from whatever style of magic is lurking in that black disc separating flesh from bone on your forearm. 

“May I look closer?” It’s as polite as you’ve ever heard Capra. Shit. Sans should really be here. If Sans had been in even a tiny bit of a worse mood, he would have insisted on coming with you, but … goddamn it, he’d insisted on _coming with you_ earlier, and now he was probably just being smug in Hotland taking pictures while you fumbled your way through this. You inhale slowly, then inch your arm forward, so that Capra can inspect it. This isn’t that weird, you assure yourself. He’s shaken your hand, before, after all, just now he’s paying very, very close attention. 

“You really can’t see a damn thing.” He’s musing to himself. “No tendons, no muscles, no nothing. Would you mind turning your hand over?” You do so, after a second, and he studies your upward facing palm even closer, then your wrist - distractedly, he runs a finger along the inside of your radius, and you gasp, jerking your arm - and body - away from him in one immediate, insulted motion. 

He blinks at you for a second, and then a look of absolute dismay crosses his face. “Oh, god. Was that very rude?” He says, and you realize, as his skin begins to flush the color of the bisque in front of him, that for once you are not seeing him on his A game - he is just as horrified as you are. You nod mutely, holding your arm tight to your side, and he lets out a low, steady stream of curses as you try to slow your heart down. He was definitely not supposed to touch you like that; every synapse in your brain is firing indignant messages that, while it was fine for Sans to do that, it was much, much too intimate for Capra! But, well, Capra’s clearly considering flinging himself onto his steak knife… 

“God. I can only offer my sincere apologies.” He finally mutters, looking like he wants to crawl under a rock. “I should have thought… I honestly didn’t realize… regardless, I should have asked, holy shit. Um. Should I leave? Or, um, do you want to go home?” He looks so wretched that you manage to pull yourself out of your indignant shock. 

“Um. No. No. It’s… fine, I guess. Just… You know, you should not just touch p-people’s arms, or, um, people in general, whenever you feel like it, you know?” You point out, and he grimaces and nods quickly, then drains the rest of his glass of wine, still looking mortified. On the upside… this is as off-kilter as you’ve ever seen him, and you realize that this is your chance to cut to the heart of the matter. “Look. Can we just… why am I here? I mean, this is a really fantastic like… I get what you’re doing here. Very dramatic set piece.” You say, gesturing at the private room, the wine, the spectacular view of the beach, with one skeletal hand. Capra takes a deep breath, looking much younger than he usually does, and sighs. 

“You’re a human. You can do magic. Clearly. You said you’ve got something beyond just having a skarm, too.” 

“Oh goddamn it-”

“Sorry, yeah, he told me about the skarm thing, it kinda stuck in my head. Again, sorry.” Capra sighs. “Look, you could actually do some huge things! Whatever type of magic you can do - and I am pretty damn sure you can goddamn teleport in and out of your office, at the very least - anyway, it’s a resource we haven’t been able to work with since the barrier fell, and frankly, I’m at my wits’ ends trying to make up for the loss of the damn barrier, and how we could have made something like that thousands of years ago, and how nobody but you seems to be working any magic now. And the fact that you seem to be able to just coincidentally do the same type of magic as your boyfriend, that answers some questions, but…”

“Look. If you thought I’d be a lab rat for you, you’re severely mistaken.” You say, glancing at your arm. “And I _can’t_ do magic for you any more than the monsters can.”

“B-but you’re human! King Asgore’s determination, it doesn’t apply to you!” Capra sounds slightly desperate. “Please, ________, as a species, hell, as two species, we need this! Our planet is goddamn dying, and we’re just letting this bureaucratic bullshit stand in the way-”

“It’s not bullshit. My friends don’t have the same rights as humans. Honestly, I don’t have the same rights as humans, anymore. I got fired for something that I’m damn sure would be illegal to fire me for, if there wasn’t any magic involved. I’m not going to be a, like, a scab, you know, like those people who would break picket lines. I stand with the monsters on this. And honestly, I know for a fact that King Asgore would extend his protection to me in a heartbeat, because he literally already has, while the human government’s just watched me get hurt! I can’t turn my back on him.”

“God… damn it. Damn it.” Capra breathes through his teeth. “I can’t blame you, I really can’t. But.. damn it.” He sounds fully disheartened. “Okay. Fuck.” He looks up, all of his sleek composition gone, as the waiter swoops in with crabcakes and lobster claws and a thousand other fussy little things for the appetizer course. “Can we talk about what you want to do at the company then, going forward-”

“Oh, god, are you firing me too?!” You say, utterly miserable at the prospect, but not in the least surprised. He freezes, then looks at you, indignant. 

“Of course not! I wouldn’t fire you because you don’t want to do magic, I understand, trust me, that shit is _clearly_ personal, I’m just now getting how little I knew about how personal it is.” He says. “No, fuck, I was wondering if you’d pick up where your parents left off. They were researching human magic, I know that, because I was their research assistant. You’re in their office now, I put all their old files on that computer, and you’ve got their books and stuff at home too, right. I’ve never been able to figure out what they were trying to figure out, but… the more we know, I think, the more beneficial for both species. You don’t need to do any magic to figure it out, either. But, you knew them better than anyone, and I think they were damn close to… _something_ , before they died...” He clears his throat after a second. “Also, could you look in on the cuttlefish tanks on LL4 every once in a while, they keep eating each other-”

“Fine.” You agree, quietly, the wheels in your head turning again. If he’s right, this is a real opportunity. You’ll be able to figure out what other humans had been capable of, to see what you might, as a mage, be able to do too. You might even be able to figure out how humans and monsters could work together to use magic as a positive force, not the weapon of war it had been the last time. 

“Deal?” He says softly, and you narrow your eyes at him, in no mood to shake his hand after the awkward arm incident - then you see he’s extending his non-dominant hand, sigh, and grasp it. 

“Deal. For as long as I’m at EbbCo.” You mutter, and he smiles, his wolfish confidence slowly returning. Damn it. Flustered Capra, you felt like you were getting the truth from. Who could possibly feel confident that they were getting the truth from Capra when he was being himself, though? “Okay, now, let’s clear the air. Please tell me every awkward and embarrassing thing Sans has done since he started working at EbbCo, because the way he told me, he’s been very cool, and I want to surprise him with the truth when he starts getting too pleased with himself.” You decide, pointedly changing the topic. Capra looks at you with wide, delighted eyes. 

“Goddamn it, I think I am in love with both of you. That’s amazing. Do you need a third person in your relationship? I would be such a fantastic third person. Consider it.” He cuts your complaint off neatly, gives you an enormous grin, and then immediately begins reeling off goofy stories about Sans. You’re soon laughing so hard that you can barely pay attention to the food, but all the same, you can’t entirely let your guard down. Capra tells his stories well, animatedly, the perfect actor, after all, and anyone who’s that good at acting…. 

Well, who knew what was really going on, beneath that glossy black head of hair?


	71. In Which Undyne Is Not Great At Thinking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay I lost my entire control of my entire life because entirely things are entirely...  
> let me try again  
> I am so fucking far behind on fanart that I'm just going to give you the fanart link and there is SOME GREAT SHIT IN THERE SO YOU CLICK IT YOU CLICK IT I AM ALL WORKED UP
> 
>  
> 
> [THIS IS THE LINK CLICK IT CLICK IT CLICK IT](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

The remainder of your first day at EbbCo is relatively painless. You return to your office after an otherwise unremarkable day - well, unremarkable besides the fact that you wanted nothing more than to drift off in the warm office after just half a glass of wine (and a ridiculously heavy lunch). This certainly was not helped by the fact that the remainder of the videos from HR seemed to drone on (and on, and on) about things that never would have occurred for you to do in the first place. No, you would not leave your computer password stickied to your monitor! No, you would definitely not get straight up racist (or sexist, or speciesist, for that matter)! Yes, you would certainly wash your hands every time you went to the bathroom!

The final indignity was when you poked out your head at five to discover an empty office - everyone had gone home, damn it, EbbCo must be that rare place that lets out early on Fridays. You’d have to ask, next time. You text Sans to tell him you’re heading home, figuring you might as well leave. You’d had to put a moratorium on texting with him earlier in the afternoon, when you realized that neither of you were accomplishing anything. You hadn’t even managed to relay how lunch with Capra had gone, because Sans had been taking the opportunity to use literally every Hotland pun he’d thought of over twenty-four years underground until you cut him off. Of course you’d immediately regretted that, once you’d been left alone with several hours of boring training videos… Well, it would be a relief to be done with “work” for the day. 

Your phone buzzes; he’s seen your text.

sans: oh, shit, is it five already  
sans: see you at home  
sans: gotta drop the camera off first

You shrug mentally, glancing around your office, and decide that, yeah, you’ve cut a doorway in here once already, so there’s no reason not to do it again. You glance around reflexively, like Capra might pop out from behind your desk or something, and then sigh, feeling silly, and cut a hole back home into the kitchen. 

“Mother of-” Undyne yelps, jumping backwards, when you step through right next to her. 

“Hah! Sorry!” You say, moving quickly out of the way. “Didn’t think anyone would be here!” She rolls a large, yellow eye. 

“Yeah, um, turns out I only stay late at work when some dork wants to stay late with me.” She drawls, and then grins at you as you seal the doorway behind yourself. “Good first day at work?” She asks, and you shrug. 

“Pretty boring. Lots of training movies. Capra took me to lunch.” 

“Aw! So you didn’t eat what I made you?”

“Sorry, Undyne, I put it in the breakroom fridge. Thanks for the note, though.” When you’d finally opened the brown paper bag, you’d found a stick figure drawing of you and Undyne (both flexing) with the caption “BFFS FOREVER”. Undyne grins. 

“Anytime. Ah jeez-” She jumps again as Sans comes walking in through midair. “Hell, can you guys do that outside or in the garage or something?!”

“sorry.” Sans doesn’t sound particularly sorry. “hey babe.” He gives you a huge grin, heading over to receive his kiss. You lean down a little to give him a peck, which he pouts at slightly, but hell, you’re having a hard enough time meeting his eyes right now, as images from a few hours ago suddenly flood your brain. “watch any more interesting movies?”

“Nah. I learned that, um, time theft is a crime.” You say with a shrug. “Which, honestly, I don’t think is accurate. Take any interesting pictures?” 

“not really. i dunno. ‘s the core. seen it a billion times, all seems boring to me.” He says blandly. 

“_______ was just telling me Capra took her to lunch.” Undyne says, arching an eyebrow. 

“yeah, she said it went fine.”

“Uh, more or less. I wanted to actually talk to you about it.” You say, clearing your throat. 

“Uh oh.” Undyne mutters. 

“agreed.” Sans glances at her. “what’d you leave out?” You groan, leaning back against the kitchen table, then suddenly push off of it like it had burned you, a flood of memories rushing back. 

The look on Sans’ face is at its most punchable. It is a damn shame you love this man so much, you think, glowering at him. 

“Well. So, he caught me in my office coming back from, um, lunch?” 

“Wait, I thought Capra took you to lunch-”

“it’s this whole... crazy thing.” Sans says knowledgeably, cutting off Undyne’s inquiry. “go on.” 

“Well, so he was waiting in my swivel chair like a weirdo to surprise me. He must have come up to find me, realized I wasn’t there, and then found out that nobody had seen me leave. He knows what I can do. Doorways, at least.” Sans winces at this. 

“i shoulda thought of that…”

“Yeah, well, me too. Anyway, um, so he asked to see the skarm at lunch-”

“God, I love it so much when you call it ‘the skarm’.” You glare up at Undyne. 

“No, no, it’s fine, I was just telling a story. I’ll wait.” She sighs, then pointedly presses her lips together, signifying that she’s done interrupting. “Anyway, I let him look but then he just up and touched the inside of my arm-”

“Ew!” Undyne laughs, wrinkling her nose. 

“he what?” Sans’ tone is much more dangerous than Undyne’s. “why didn’t you tell me?!”

“Babe, he didn’t know.” You sigh. Undyne blinks at the two of you. 

“What am I missing?” She says, her brow furrowed. 

“See?” You say, gesturing to Undyne. “It’s not obvious…” Sans looks very unhappy still, which, well, you can’t blame him. At the same time, you’re sure Capra’s mistake was absolutely innocent, but still…

“skeletons don’t have skin to give us privacy.” He explains slowly to Undyne. “we’re a lot more exposed.” You realize that he’s including you in the category of ‘skeletons,’ and feel vaguely honored, if a little unsettled by it. “there’s rules, to be polite. you’d know ‘em if you thought about ‘em. like, you could pat my back, right? wouldn’t be weird?” Undyne nods. “but would you stick, uh, your fingers through my ribs?” He’s blushing slightly at the thought. 

“Gah! No!” Undyne sputters, then her eye grows round with understanding as Sans continues. 

“but she could. wouldn’t be weird. it’s... polite to behave as if we have the same physical properties as other people, unless you’re really close. get it?” Undyne nods slowly, and Sans turns back to you. “what’d he do, babe?” 

“Look, he apologized the second he did something weird. I’m not his biggest fan, I’m not defending him, I’m just saying… ugh.” You trail off under his unrelenting stare, lift your arm, roll up your sleeve to the elbow, and demonstrate, dragging your finger down the length of your radius.

“asshole!” Sans snaps instantly, his eye flashing. “wonder how he’d like it if i showed up and did that to him, huh?” 

“Sans. Be cool.” You demand, and he takes a minute to comply, before his eye fades to its normal starry white. “Like I said. He didn’t know. He won’t do it again.”

“better fucking not.”

“Anyway.” It’s wise to get off this subject, because you think Sans still has half a mind to show Capra how rude he’d been, and since that would require opening up Capra’s _arm_... “He was totally off his game after that. It was actually pretty awesome. He was like all pink and awkward and stammer-y and I asked what he wanted, and he asked if I’d help him with magic-”

“figures.”

“Oh, c’mon, Sans, you’re not going to be a total butt to him now, are you? I think you’re his best friend. I think you’re his _only_ friend. Anyway. Obviously, I told him no.” Neither Undyne or Sans look at all surprised by this, to your immense pleasure; you’d hoped that they thought well of you to know you would never go behind the monsters’ back, but this was actual proof. “So he asked me if I would look into the history of humans doing magic instead. He said that it was what my parents were looking into when they died, which, I know we pretty much knew, but…” You trail off and shrug. “I mean, could be useful for me at least, right?”

“yeah…” Sans still looks pensive and irritated. “anything else?”

“Um, he told me that you made such a weird face in your picture for your ID badge that you refused to wear it until he let you retake the picture?”

“...goddamn it.” Sans grumbles, and wraps his arm around your waist. You look down at him, and see for the first time just how cagey he looks. He’s trying to be normal for your sake, or at least not actively mad, but he is clearly on edge.

“C’mon, let’s go for a walk outside.” You decide. He tilts his head at you, suddenly looking worried. “You’re not in trouble, I just think you need to see outside for a while.” You explain quietly. He grimaces, then nods.

“you’re probably right.”

\----------------------------------------

Outside, you take his hand, almost carelessly drawing a door in the air so Spot can come out and play. Spot comes bursting out, before the door’s even really open, leaving a jagged edge in reality that makes you grimace. 

“Bad girl. You gotta wait.” You grumble, trying to mend the hole at least a little. Spot chirps unapologetically, floating over to nuzzle your side. Sans smiles at the two of you, and says, 

“you’re thinking too hard. don’t try to match up all the edges, just mash them together. reality doesn’t like having holes in it.” You blink, then try as he advised.

“Oh! Yeah. That’s way easier. Thanks, Sans.” He grins crookedly. 

“i should probably be teachin’ you more, huh?” He asks quietly. You frown, thinking. 

“I mean, I wouldn’t turn it down. It’s more or less like… an instinct, you know?”

“i know. but i should be teachin’ you stuff like that. you just, you know, you picked it up and ran with it, and i remembered what you said, you don’t do the controlling boyfriend thing-”

“Oh, god, Sans, that was forever ago. I didn’t really know you back then.” You sigh (even though, well, it had barely been a month ago). 

“still.” He kicks a clump of dirty snow, and Spot keens softly. 

“Baby, I would love your help. And I don’t think you’re controlling.” You assure him. 

“even though i just freaked out about capra touching your arm? fuck, sounds so stupid when i say it out loud.” 

“Hey. I wouldn’t be pleased if someone did that to you, either. You’re mine.” You say, then feel mildly surprised at the vehemence of your tone. “Uh…” But he’s grinning now, a true smile that reaches his eyes. 

“good.” You both fall silent for a while, walking slowly through the backyard. Sans conjures a few bones from nowhere and throws them in wide arcs for Spot to chase after. Spot is always a little skeptical around Sans - you’re not sure why - but after a minute, she can’t resist the lure any longer and bolts off to catch her prize. 

“D’you have any of, um, those things? What do we call her? I hate ‘Gaster Blaster’ now that I know your dad is an _abusive, creepy spy_.” You drawl pointedly, just in case the omnidimensional being in question is listening in on this mundane conversation. Sans snorts. 

“dunno. we’ll try and think of something.” He says, then shrugs. “one of ‘em likes me a little more than the others, i s’pose. just doesn’t have the same manners as your girl.”

“Yeah?” You turn to look at him, and he sighs. 

“yeah. spot’s new. she’s a pup, i think. showed up seven or eight years ago, youngest gb i’ve seen. all the other ones knew dad. they’re not half as nice. not what they were trained for.” 

“Gaster.” It’s a complete sentence. 

“fuckin’ gaster.” He accepts the slobbery bone Spot brings back, and throws it again. 

“You had a really shitty day today, didn’t you?” You finally sigh. 

“uh. not the middle.” He points out, and you grin, in spite of yourself. “middle was awesome. but… i don’t love being in the core. went down there for capra’s sake, and then i find out he’s touchin’ you…” He grumbles. 

“Hey. Hey. Accident, remember? I’m amazed I didn’t do anything that stupid when we first started dating.” You remind him quietly. 

“woulda been fine.” He says, but he’s hiding a smile. 

“Oh yeah? If I sat down next to you in the vet’s office and just had a free-for-all inside your arm, you’d have been cool with it?” You tease him, and he snorts. 

“mm. maybe not.” He leans against you after a moment, looking up at the sky. “i don’t wanna go back down there again.” You know he’s talking about the Underground. 

“Then tell him, baby. He’s… a lot of things, but I don’t think he’d hold it against you. I think he’d let you do whatever you wanted. He asked if we needed a third person in our relationship for Pete’s sake, I think it’s safe to say that he loves you.” He bursts out laughing at that. 

“what did you tell him?” 

“I told him, yes, please, sign me the fuck up, oh baby oh baby we need that Capra lovin’.” You say in a deadpan, and he nudges your shoulder playfully, still grinning, before he kisses you. When he’s decided he’s done, he sighs softly and looks up at the sky once more. 

“feels so much better, being out here.” He mutters, and part of you feels warm, that you’d known what was wrong without him saying it. “god, i could look at this view for ages.” 

“Let’s try the telescope again tonight. Me and you and Paps.” You propose, and he beams at you again. 

“yeah. i owe paps some bro time. he’s been so good about all the change, and i’ve kinda been…” He trails off, and points to his skull. Yeah. You know. He’s been living in his own head for a while, recently. You’ve had that in common. 

“Well, it’s Friday. Let’s all hang out.” You say, and he nods eagerly. “You ready to go back in?” You ask, and he squeezes you closer. 

“few more minutes?”

A few more minutes it is. 

\---------------------------------------------

Later, after dinner, Undyne pulls you aside. 

“Hey pal. I’ve been thinking.” She says, sounding a little cautious. 

“Uh oh.” You can’t help yourself. She growls playfully and swats your arm. 

“I’m GREAT at thinking, human. Anyway. You wanna find out about the human mages, you know who you should be talking to? Asgore. Like, man, you should definitely be talking to Asgore, he was there for all of it, the war, everything!” You blink. 

“How…. how old are Asgore and Toriel?”

“I told you! Like a jillion!” She laughs. “But seriously. He was king back then, before the barrier, too. You should ask him.” You chew on your lip for a second, then nod. 

Real answers sound, uh, _real_ good, right about now.


	72. In Which You Meet Some Lovely People at the Playground!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *chants the word plot repeatedly*
> 
> Come visit your [trashmom](totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com).

The rest of the evening is lovely, really. Papyrus is super, ultra jazzed to be allowed to look through the telescope again, and seems so happy to be spending time with Sans that you feel almost guilty. You’ve been occupying so much of your boyfriend’s time with your problems, and poor Papyrus has been so patient, not to mention kind, to tolerate the fact that he’s had to share Sans. Watching him shuffle happily from foot to foot as he stares up at Jupiter through the eyepiece of the telescope, you grin, feeling like you’ve done a good thing, thinking of this. Sans, sitting crosslegged on the ground next to you, glances at your expression and gives you a sleepy smile, then leans to rest his head on your shoulder, his eyes fixed on the spot out of the window where the sky meets the water. 

You wonder if he wants to see what’s out there, beyond that horizon. For the first time, you feel a slight twinge of concern in your chest. Are you holding him back? But then he wraps his arm around your waist, and you relax slightly. When things are a little easier out there for the two of you, you’ll both explore the world beyond Mt. Ebott, and see if things had changed out there since you were small. You’d see if the rest of the world was ready for someone like you. 

Papyrus yawns, once he’s had his fourth or fifth turn looking at different stars and planets, and Sans smiles fondly at him and gets to his feet. 

“c’mon bud. time for bed. you know what story you want?” 

You hang back, letting Sans spend a little time with Papyrus on his own, and head to bed. You’re more than half asleep by the time that Sans pads quietly in, though you sigh happily when he curls up behind you. His hand rests on your forearm, and after a moment he begins to stroke it, his fingers sliding over smooth bone. You immediately understand his motivation, but you don’t complain. Besides, it feels nice. He keeps that up long after you drift off to sleep, until he finally joins you. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------

“hey.” 

“Mphhh stopppp.” It’s your first real day off in more than two weeks, and some stupid skeleton is shaking your shoulder. 

“thought you wanted to see frisk and tori?”

“When it’s daytimeee.”

“it’s eleven.” He points out, which gets you to peel your eyes open at last. “jeez, you can sleep. and that’s coming from me!”

“I was tired!” You protest, trying to stay grumpy, but goddamn it, he’s smiling at you in that way that makes it just about impossible to stop from smiling back. “Okay. Okay. Lemme… ugh, is it really eleven? Ugh.”

An hour later, Sans is opening a door to Toriel’s doorstep for you and Papyrus (Undyne’s at work, Alphys is tinkering, and L.D. is… well, he’s digging a hole in the back yard, which seems important). Papyrus goes charging through first, and is urgently ringing Toriel’s doorbell before you’re even halfway through. You sigh contently, looking at Toriel’s home, as Sans steps through behind you. It’s a sweet little cottage, all one story, tucked into the pine forest at the base of Mt. Ebott. Even outside, the scent of baked goods is in the air, mixed with the scent of pine, the sea air from the bay on the other side of the mountain, and the clean smell of snow - there’s been another shower last night, and everything looks fresh and new. 

The door clatters open, as Frisk comes sailing out the door to tackle Papyrus. They’re dressed for the weather in snow pants, boots, a puffy coat and mittens, and you find it hard to spare your cousin’s dignity by telling them that they look adorable. Toriel’s a few steps behind, smiling. 

“Oh, good! You’re just in time. Frisk and I packed a picnic basket to take to the playground.” 

“THE PLAYGROUND!” Papyrus is rapturous, and scoops Frisk up to put on his shoulders, looking ready to take off sprinting. He just barely constrains himself, looking back and forth between you, Sans and Toriel, and reminding you irresistibly of L.D. when he’s spotted a squirrel. This is clearly an old routine you’re being invited to join, which makes you feel quite happy. Frisk leans down from their perch to pat your head in welcome, and Toriel bustles inside to get the picnic basket, then steps back out, bundled up in a lovely purple peacoat and a hat. 

“I am so happy to see you again, my niece!” She exclaims, hugging you carefully. “Are you still feeling well? Your arm is not giving you any trouble?”

“I’m fine.” You laugh. “It’s nice to see you too, Tori.” She beams at you, then looks at the quivering Papyrus. “Go on ahead.” She says with a laugh. “We will meet you there.” Papyrus whoops and takes off, Frisk clinging to his shoulders and grinning manically. 

“never in my life had that much energy.” Sans sighs, which you’re not entirely sure is truthful. You’d seen him at his most energetic, after all. “hey, tori.” He moves forward to accept her hug, and then the three of you walk down the gravel road to the public playground, which you discover is adjacent to Toriel’s small school. When you arrive, you discover that you aren’t the only people to have had this idea; the little playground is filled with children (mostly human, but a few monsters) making snow forts, clambering over the equipment, and generally just being kids. Papyrus is pushing Frisk as high as they can go on the swingset, while several children look on in absolute awe. 

“careful, paps. kid’ll go flying to the moon if they let go.” Sans cautions, and Toriel nods firmly. Papyrus heaves a sigh and decreases the energy behind his pushing just a little, simultaneously telling Frisk, 

“I LOOKED AT THE MOON THROUGH THE TELESCOPE LAST NIGHT, FRISK, AND I THINK YOU’VE BEEN TELLING ME SOME LIES ABOUT IT. SANS AND ________ ASSURED ME THAT IT ISN’T A BIG WHITE MEATBALL.” You giggle, as Toriel stifles a laugh. 

“we shouldn’ta told him. he was really _im-pasta-ble_ to deal with after that.” 

“You used that one last night.” You point out. 

“yeah, well, tori didn’t hear it.” He grins obnoxiously at you, and you sigh, helping Toriel brush snow off a picnic table to lay out your lunch. 

“It was very good, Sans!” She assures him, then, sitting, looks seriously at you. “My niece, I have been hearing from many people that you are having a hard time due to your arm.” She says, a little sadly. “I am very sorry to hear that you have been mistreated.” 

“Oh… yeah. I mean, I guess lots of people have been nice to me too, but…” You can’t really keep it up, because thinking about Undyne at work, while you’re… not, it still stings. Sans notices, of course. 

“capra gave her a new job though.” He says, and Toriel nods. 

“The buisnessman on the other side of the mountain. Yes. He has been employing many monsters.” She says, sounding reserved. “My h-” She cuts herself off, then tries again. “King Asgore is unsure about him. He seems to mean well, but he keeps pushing for access to the Underground and permission for his employees to use magic… Asgore says it is a little offputting.”

“yeah. he does that.” Sans snorts, rifling through the picnic basket. 

“Hey. Wait until Papyrus and Frisk are ready for lunch!” You laugh. 

“but you haven’t eaten yet today? humans gotta eat.” He says plaintively, and Toriel looks sternly at you. 

“Breakfast is very important for humans!” She says, indignant at the very idea. God, when had you gone from nobody looking out for you to… this? Rolling your eyes, you say, 

“I’ll be fine for a few more minutes.”

“i’m gettin’ frisk and paps.” Sans sighs, standing up. As he walks over to retrieve the two companions, you look back at Toriel. 

“Hey, question. Capra asked me if I could start looking into human mages, you know, from the old days. I mean, it seems like I’m the only person we’ve heard of that can do anything magic, you know, other than Frisk seeing souls… I don’t know, I mean, I kinda just want to know what to expect. Undyne says maybe you or Asgore might know something?” Toriel’s expression has grown curiously blank as you talk, which you can’t help but notice. 

“I am afraid that I do not know anything about human mages.” She says quietly. “I was not particularly involved with the war effort. And it was so long ago. Excuse me, I should help Sans collect Papyrus and Frisk.” She stands up, walking brusquely over to the swingset, where Frisk is clinging stubbornly to the chains of the swing, refusing to be separated from the fun for something so mundane as lunch. 

Well, that was not a productive conversation, you think, staring after the queen. 

While you sit there, watching and trying to figure out what Toriel’s reaction might have meant, two women walk past you, their children, who look to be around Frisk’s age, in tow. 

“Okay, go off and have fun.” One of the women, a short brunette, says.

“And remember the rules!” The blonde next to her calls, as their children charge for the wooden castle in the center of the playground. You smile after them; they’re cute kids. The women turn and give you friendly smiles, then begin setting up on the picnic table next to yours.

“Oh. Kathy. Look at that.” One of the women says in a hushed voice, spotting Papyrus trying to pry Frisk off the swing. Toriel is still bustling sternly over, and Sans is standing by the side of the swingset, looking a little too amused to really help. You can’t help but eavesdrop. “Oh, goodness, is that monster hurting that child? Should we be calling the police?” Oh, gosh. You speak up quickly. 

“Oh, um, they know each other, don’t worry.” Both women turn to look at you again, and this time, they really study you. You realize, too late, that you’ve left your exposed hand sticking out of your coat sleeve and resting on the table. They both notice it as well, and one of them gives a disgusted huff before looking away. 

“Awful, isn’t it?” The brunette sighs. “That one’s even trying to pass off as a human.” They’re not even trying to be quiet. 

“There should be a law.”

“There really should.” 

“I think it’s disgusting, those monsters harassing that little child.” 

“I’m beginning to think - oh, ugh.” Frisk finally has had enough, and hops off the swing to take Papyrus’ hand and lead him back to the picnic table. “That freak was telling the truth.” 

“It’s still not right. That’s why I told the kids, you heard me, ‘we don’t speak to monsters, they’re filthy inside and out-’”

“Hey.” You snap suddenly, as Frisk comes closer. They both turn back to you, looking very annoyed. “I would really appreciate it if you didn’t say things like that around my little cousin, okay? I don’t really care what you think, but this is a place for all kids to play, they don’t deserve to have to hear things like that.” The blonde huffs a sigh again, as they turn back away. 

“Cousin.” 

“It thinks it’s a human.” 

“Oh, goodness, I think I recognize it! Kathy, Kathy, isn’t it that thing from the news, the human who’s having _relations_ with a monster and it got mutated or something?” You’re already feeling quite angry, but now, your hand is curling into an unconscious fist, and you’re shaking slightly. 

“Practically bestiality.”

“It’s disgusting, that’s what it is.”

“God only knows what it’s doing to that little kid when there’s no humans around to keep it safe…”

You don’t know how it happens; you’re sitting there, trembling with anger one minute, and the next, you’re on your feet, heatless purple flames flickering down your arm, and there’s something solid in your hand, something heavy that feels right, feels ready to throw - a bone… a spear? it’s sharp and it’s white and it’s _yours_ \- and you can hear her again, through the void, you can hear Spot screaming to be let out and rain down hell. 

“hey, hey.” A heartbeat later, Sans is by your side. He’s noticed, even if nobody else has. The two women, their backs turned to you, are entirely unaware of what’s just happened. Sans is looking up at you, his eyes bright and urgent. “not here. not worth it.” He murmurs.

“They said-”

“they’re gonna say a lot. c’mon. walk away.” Part of you can’t stop thinking about how rich it is, that he’s the one telling you to calm down, after the number of times you’ve had to give him the same lecture. Most of you, though, is trying to pay attention. He’s right. You know he’s right. 

“Sans.” You look at the ivory spear in your hand, trying to catch your breath, trying to focus. 

“just drop it. it’ll go.” He guides, and you do so, after a second of hard thought - it falls soundlessly into the snow, and he takes your hand, fearless of the purple flames still licking over the bones. “you’re okay.”

As Papyrus and Torel draw nearer, cautious expressions on their faces - Toriel’s holding Frisk rather closely to her side - the two women at the table seem to shrink, realizing for the first time, perhaps, the size of the monsters they were mocking just seconds ago. The sound of Spot’s shrieks is fading from your head now, replaced by a quiet, quizzical sound from Frisk. You take a deep breath, then another, and the spear on the ground disintegrates into nothing, the flame slowly dying out, until it’s a soft glow, then it’s just the regular color of your coat and the white bones of your hand clutched in Sans’ grip. 

“hey guys. think we should probably have lunch back at the house after all. more pleasant company.” Sans says quietly, and even Frisk seems to gather the weight behind his tone, since they don’t complain, just cuddle up against Toriel’s leg as Papyrus gathers the picnic basket. “c’mon. let’s head back.” He doesn’t make a doorway, perhaps leery about showing more magic in front of all these humans. Maybe he just wants to give you some time to walk your rage off. 

Regardless, the trek back to the cottage is more or less silent, which gives you plenty of time to overanalyze the occasional wary glance Toriel is casting in your direction. You have to wonder just what you’d looked like back there, to make her look at you like that. You have to wonder what she’s seen, in those “jillion” years of life, to make her look so anxious around you right now. 

And you have to remember the very basic monster history that you already knew; that human mages were certainly not the good guys.


	73. In Which Toriel Says Nothing Horrifying

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys know the drill! 
> 
>  
> 
> [The Chill or Be Chilled Fanart Tag!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> And NOW, introducing something I should have done a while ago:
> 
> [Chill or Be Chilled on SoundCloud!](https://soundcloud.com/eliasaurus/sets/chill-or-be-chilled)  
> See, [ardoustus](http://ardoustus.tumblr.com) is doing something amazing and awesome and impressive; embarking on the daunting job of narrating CoBC audiobook style. Furthermore, homie's doing an amazing job. Go check it out, since it's a) super fun, and b) honestly one of the most flattering things that's ever happened to TST. 
> 
> OKAY I LOVE YOU HERE IS A LONG CHAPTER.

When you arrive back at the cottage, Toriel gives you a brittle smile. 

“If you are not feeling very well, niece, I would understand if you needed to go home? It would likely be best if you did so.” She says quietly. It sounds more like a request than an inquiry after your health. 

It feels like a punch to the gut.

“tori.” Sans’ voice is low and dangerous. “she’s good. she’s stayin’.” Frisk looks between the three of you, alarmed, while Papyrus hangs back slightly, a grin frozen on his face that doesn’t look the least bit sincere. 

“Uh. Um. No, um, Toriel’s probably right, I should go.” You say, and are horrified to hear how thin and quavery your voice is. You just can’t stop thinking, god, here’s another aunt that doesn’t want you. Maybe there really was something wrong with you; most people never had this particular problem, and here it was, happening again. “Um, Sans, will you please stay and just keep an eye on everything here, for me?” You say, desperately trying to keep your cool. Couldn’t cry, couldn’t panic. You weren’t alone. Other people loved you. Sans loved you. You weren’t going to be alone this time. And… Frisk. You needed to put them first. You’d wanted to spend time with Frisk this weekend because you were still worried Paula was going to do something stupid, and it seemed like it was no longer appropriate for you to be that first line of defense.

Sans is glowering at Toriel now. You’ve never seen him look like that when he’s with your friends before.

“babe. stay here. tori made you a sandwich and a snack and everything.” He says, quiet and even. “toriel would never turn you away just because you were tryin’ to stick up for frisk, right?” He couldn’t have overheard what the women were saying about you or Frisk, so you’re a little surprised that he says that, but you’re not in any mood to question his help right now.

 **Why were you sticking up for me? What happened?** Frisk asks the group, their eyes wide. 

“Nothing, sweetie.” You say quietly, leaning down slightly so Frisk can meet your eyes better and trying to keep your distress off your face. “Some ladies at the playground were saying some mean stuff about monsters, that’s all. I lost my temper. I shouldn’t have.” Frisk frowns solemnly at that. 

**Why do you want to go home? Are you still mad?** You can’t help it - for a split second, you glance at Toriel, hoping that she might have an excuse for you, something, anything, to keep from saying the wrong thing to Frisk. The frosty expression on her face has disappeared, replaced with something apologetic and more than a little embarrassed. After a moment, she places a heavy paw on your shoulder. 

“She is not still mad.” She tells Frisk quietly. “I am just being foolish. Please, niece. Stay. Forgive me. I was… making assumptions.” You swallow roughly, trying to fight the instinct that tells you to throw her paw off your shoulder and run, run to a place where someone you were just learning to treat as family could no longer hurt you. It stings. It hurts so much that she suddenly has that power over you. God, they all do, every single one of them, if they turn you away, if you’re no longer welcome in that tight circle...

“PLEASE?” Papyrus says, awfully quietly. Sans is silent, still giving Toriel a hard look, but his grip on your hand - he still hasn’t let go - tightens just a little. 

“Okay.” You finally whisper, and Toriel, looking a strange combination of anxious and relieved, pushes the door to her home open and ushers you all inside. 

\-----------------------------------------------

Lunch is still a rather tense affair. You can’t shake the feeling that Toriel really, really doesn’t want you there, and Toriel is overdoing it, trying to prove to everyone that this isn’t the case. She fusses over you too much, and you withdraw further and further from the fussing and the conversation, nibbling at a corner of your sandwich and staring distractedly down at your hand. 

Sans is clearly not happy that you’re not happy, and when Toriel begins to gently upbraid him for not eating, he snaps at her:

“lost my damn appetite.” 

The room is awkward, silent, until Papyrus forces conversation again, talking about the floral varietals he’d picked out for the palace to suit the fact that the Underground was now dappled with rays of true sunshine. You’ve nibbled through a third of your sandwich by the time that Papyrus and Frisk get up to play again, heading for Frisk’s comic books. Sans still hasn’t touched a thing, and is just glaring into the middle distance, his hand on your back. Finally, Toriel sighs and stands up. 

“Would you care to go for a walk with me, my niece?” She asks quietly. Sans tenses so much that you can feel it even in his hand. You take a moment to collect yourself, and then nod slowly. 

“where we goin’?” Sans wants to know. You clear your throat, then say, softly,

“Hang back with Frisk and Paps, babe. I’ll be fine.” He looks seriously at you, and all you want at that moment is for him to be holding you the way he holds you while you sleep, to feel secure, to feel like nobody’s going to reject you for not being human enough, or not being monster enough. He doesn’t seem to mind you occupying that liminal space, but clearly not everyone was so understanding as him; certainly not the moms at the playground, but apparently not Toriel either. 

“you don’t look fine.” He mutters. 

“I’ll be with Toriel.” You say quietly, and his eyes flash irritation again. 

“doesn’t make me feel much better.” Normally, you’d scold him gently; he’s being very rude right now. This time, though… well, you get it. Toriel has certainly heard him and looks thoroughly chastened. Perhaps that’s what gets you to stand up and give Toriel a shaky smile. Sans watches you from his chair for another moment, then stands up as well. “i’m right here if you need me.” He tells you softly, his face full of worry for a split second as he meets your eyes, before the annoyed, stubborn expression returns as he looks over at Toriel. “be. kind.” He hisses at her, under his breath, then he slaps his laziest smile on as he goes over to join Frisk and Papyrus. 

Outside, the sun is already low in the sky. You hate this time of year for that; the days are so short. Toriel exhales heavily, her breath forming a warm cloud around her. 

“There is a lovely trail behind my home. It leads to the bay. I have walked it several times, these past few weeks, to look across the water for your house. To make sure…” She trails off, and you imagine what she fears she might see; a mansion in flames, her dear friends in peril. “Would you like to see?” You nod silently, and she leads the way.

You crunch along in silence for a few minutes through the wooded trail, before Toriel speaks up. “I was not aware that you were able to use your magic offensively, dear niece.” You wince, and clear your throat. 

“N-neither was I.” You mutter, and she stops in her tracks to look at you. 

“You have never summoned a projectile before?” She asks, and you swallow and shake your head. She studies you for a moment, and then she heaves a heavy sigh. “Monster children learn how to do so when they are very young.” She says, beginning to walk again. “Our attacks reflect our nature, I believe. My husband and I produce fire, which is quite expected for our kind.” She regards you again. “Why do you believe you produced a spear, young one?” She asks quietly. 

“Um… probably because I’ve been hanging out a lot with Undyne at work, past two weeks.” You say, barely audible, and she blinks at you, not expecting that answer at all. 

“What?” She says, and you give a small, anxious shrug. 

“Um. Sans did some experiments? To find out how my magic works I guess? He was worried my arm would fall apart?” You say, quiet, your eyes downcast, feeling twelve again, feeling like any answer might prompt your aunt’s rage. “And um, he found out that my soul, um, it absorbs extra magic, in the air, that monsters leave behind? So that’s probably why I made a spear, I think, because I’ve been hanging out a lot with Undyne, and she can make a spear? But ‘s bone, ‘cause Sans...” You trail off, and she looks at you.

“My child… are you sure that is the entire truth?” She says quietly, and when you look at her, lost for words, she grits her teeth and continues. “I never did study the human mages. My concern, during the war, was protecting the children. Protecting my people. I had no interest in the ‘hows’ or the ‘whys.’ But my husband told me with confidence that in order to work offensive magic… that the human mages needed to do… _terrible_ things, to gain such power.” You blink at her, feeling her gaze, deep and intelligent and ancient, resting on you. Not accusing, not suspicious, just…

“Oh. Goddd.” You suddenly groan, realizing what you’re going to need to tell her. Oh, god, this is the stuff of actual nightmares, because there she is, all wise and maternal and queenly, so concerned about the fate of her friends and her people and her child, and you are going to have to tell her the absolutely ridiculous truth. “Um, Toriel. Sans is… um. Giving me some of his magic.” You say quickly. She looks at you, uncomprehending. 

“But… my child, you just told me that you absorb the excess magic that monsters leave behind.” She says.

Oh. God.

“Um. Yeah. I do.” There’s a very interesting pinecone on the tree behind her. You focus all of your energy on that pinecone. “He, um. We… you know. We’re… _intimate._ ” You finally hiss, barely believing that this is happening. You can’t meet her eyes, but you can still see, from your peripheral vision, the confusion spread over her face. “He’s a skeleton.” You say in a rush. “Um. So. You know. It’s all magic. The whole… his…” You give up, and make a vague gesture at waist level. “And so when he, um, uh…. _finishes…_ ”

Two large, doelike eyes are locked on you. 

Suddenly, a peal of laughter erupts from her. “Oh! Goodness!” She blinks at you, and then begins laughing uncontrollably. “Oh… Oh dear, I am so s-sorry…” She attempts, between gasps of laughter. “I simply did not think… m-magic that he leaves behind…” Her voice gets higher and higher as she talks, and you consider making a doorway to the center of the earth and just starting a new life as some sort of subterranean creature. One that hasn’t had to explain to the queen of all monsters that her magic spear powers were apparently screwed into her. “Oh my dear. Oh, I am so terribly sorry.” She finally gathers her composure. “I just… I just… I was so worried about Frisk.” She finally manages, and nods at the path, continuing to walk towards your destination.

It’s your turn to look bewildered by the sudden nonsequetor. Not just bewildered, of course. You’re still blushing, furiously warm, and more than a little off-kilter. But you’re _also_ bewildered. She takes a deep breath, signifying that she’s imparting something important. “Your cousin… Both Asgore and I believe that Frisk is an innate mage. It is an intimidating thing.” She finally says, sounding more serious. “There were legends, of course, of humans and monsters living in harmony, working great magical feats together. But when my husband and I were children, the war was already well on its way to starting. The human mages were rarely seen, and for every fact surrounding them, a thousand more rumors arose. The only conclusive story was that the mages were monstrous, that they thirsted for our demise. And then… the barrier.” She shudders, then looks seriously at you. “And now, Frisk… they can see souls, they managed to avoid being harmed by so many monsters in the Underground, and _somehow_ , they brought the barrier down…” Her eyes look distant for a moment. 

“We are so proud of our child.” She says, after a second’s hesitation. “But… we do have fears. We fear our abilities as parents. We fear that we may fail again.” Again? You nearly interrupt, but she presses onwards. “And we fear that perhaps there is something about using magic that may lead the human soul astray, may lead it down dark paths. But then we met you.” She says, eyes brightening. “I watched you, as you recuperated after Christmas, and as you began to embrace your magic.” She smiles fondly at you.

“I felt such relief. Relief that Frisk would have you as a role model, for being human, and for using magic. But then, today, at the playground - goodness, you certainly gave me a shock.” She says, her voice dropping. “I am ashamed of the assumptions that I made. All I could think of were the rumors, the tales from my childhood about the terrible things that human war mages did to collect their power, and the fact that my husband believed that they had some basis in reality, and… I doubted you. I feared that I did not understand you at all, that you must have done terrible things too, to earn the spear in your hand. And I apologize. Oh, my niece, I am sorry. I should not have doubted.” She says, stopping again to clasp your hand between two heavy, soft paws. 

“I understand.” You say, after a moment of deep thought. You think you truly do. Understanding Toriel’s caution as the reaction of a scared mother who wanted nothing more than to protect her child… You can’t really criticize her. It had been the same reason you’d snapped and summoned that spear in the first place. But even more than that, Toriel had lived through the great human/monster war, and you are beginning to realize the enormity of the terrible things she had seen, not to mention the constant negative reminder of human mages that the barrier must have been. “I had no idea what you were thinking of me. I should have… I mean, I shouldn’t have reacted like that in the first place. With magic. I’m still not even sure how I did it. I was just so mad, the things they were saying about me, and you, and Frisk. They called me an ‘it.’” You whisper after a moment. “Like I wasn’t even human. Like I was an object, or livestock. And Frisk…” 

“I know.” She says, and gathers you into a tight hug after a moment. Her fur smells like cinnamon and brown sugar, and you feel so relieved to be hugged by her, to be forgiven, that you can’t maintain a feeling of indignation that she’d think so poorly of you. You probably should be angrier, but you’ve been knocked so far off stable footing, been reminded so thoroughly of how it felt to have a woman who called you “niece” pull the rug out from under you, that you’re just relieved it’s over. “Look.” She whispers, after a moment. “Just over this hill, the bay.” She releases you, and you walk together. You smile, just a little, when you see the other side. The sea grass and the sand and the seawater spill out in front of you, the way they always do, making your problems seem smaller. 

“_______.” She murmurs, after a moment. “You must learn to be cautious, my dear. This is a lesson that monster children must learn young. I am sorry that it is being thrust upon you now. You can not react like that, with anger and magic. Not to words, nor to taunts. When a monster snaps at another monster, it is one thing, but when magic is used against humans… we are in a precarious position, dear one, and even if I am not your Queen, I beg that you follow this directive, for the sake of us all.”

“You are my Queen.” You say honestly. “And… I know.” You add, chagrined. “I know what I did could have caused huge problems if anyone had noticed, I’ve told Sans the same thing a thousand times. I honestly didn’t even know what I was doing.” 

“Then he must teach you.” She looks at you from the corner of her eye. “Your magic is the most like his, correct? Well, certainly, since he is the largest contributor of magic to your soul.” You can detect the tiniest hint of amusement in her voice again from that discovery of the source of your magic, and you feel that embarrassment well up in you again. It must be obvious on your face, because she sees fit to try to make you feel better. “Oh my child.” She chuckles after a moment. “You have nothing to be ashamed of. Intercourse is a perfectly natural thing. Goodness knows that Asgore and I have been attempting to make up for lost time, since our reconciliation on New Year’s Eve!” She says merrily. Oh god. How is this happening right now? “And truly, it seems that you and Sans are something of an ideal pairing! Magical ejaculation would have been wasted on anyone else, surely.” She says cheerfully. “But you can put it to good use!”

You’d thought you’d reached the limits of embarrassment before, but… Nope. This is worse. This marks easily one of the worst conversations of all time. You could not sit here, with the queen, and discuss your boyfriend’s magic cum. 

“Toriel. This is not helping me feel not ashamed.” You squeak, and very, very quickly change the subject. “But… Tori. You keep telling me that the ancient human mages did something terrible to get enough power to do magical attacks. What… what did they do? You must have some idea, even if you don’t know for sure?” The mirth on her face disappears almost immediately. 

“I truly do not know.” She says. “I know the rumors, but I hesitate to share them with you; they may be much worse than the truth. They may be much better, too.” You open your mouth to protest, and she cuts you off. “If you really must know, I suggest that you ask King Asgore. If he sees fit, I am certain that he will tell you.”

Asgore, you think, had seen fit to slaughter six human children for magical power. The skin on the back of your neck prickles as you begin to wonder what would be terrible enough to bring pause to even the monarch of the monsters. 

\-----------------------------------------

When you return to Toriel’s cottage, Papyrus is waiting eagerly at the door. “TORIEL!” He says excitedly, the second she steps inside, just in front of you. “SANS AND FRISK AND I WERE ALL TALKING, AND WE CAME UP WITH A FANTASTIC IDEA! FRISK SHOULD HAVE A SLUMBER PARTY BACK AT OUR HOUSE, BECAUSE WE HAVE BETTER TOYS AND _________ HAS STAR WARS AND FRISK WANTS TO SHOW IT TO US!” Sans glances up from his sprawled out position in Toriel’s recliner, a spark of something challenging in his eye.

“yeah. figured the kid could use some bonding time with us. and their cousin.” He says pointedly. “unless there’s some reason you don’t want the kiddo around us, tori.” Oh, he’s not exactly subtle when it comes to baiting her, is he? But Toriel, in a much better mood after a significantly less tense walk back to the cottage, simply beams at him. 

“Oh, Sans, that would be wonderful! Asgore and I were actually hoping to spend some time together -” She winks at you. You pretend not to notice. “ - and I know how much fun Frisk has at your house. Is that arrangement acceptable for you, ______?” Sans is looking rather surprised, but you smile quickly and nod. 

“Yeah, of course! We all love hanging out with Frisk.” You say brightly. Toriel beams.

“Wonderful! Then perhaps we will all meet for brunch tomorrow at _______’s house?” She says sunnily, and you nod again. 

“...well, uh, you heard her, kiddo, pack a bag and let’s get goin’.” Sans says with a shrug, pushing out of the recliner and crossing over to stand by your side. He gives you a quick once over, his brows raised; it’s a wordless ‘you ok?’ And you really are, you think, so you give him a reassuring smile and lean to press a soft kiss on his cheekbone. He looks relieved, after that, but once you’ve said your goodbyes to Toriel, received your hugs, and stepped through the doorway back home, he pulls you aside and leads you down the kitchen hallway, into the first deserted room with a couch, pulling you into a seat. Only then does he crush an urgent, needy kiss to your lips, and you realize that he needs reassurance, much more so than you’d realized. 

“jeez.” he pants when he pulls away. “you scared the shit out of me back there. oh god. you almost made soccer mom shish-kebabs.” You stare at him, uncomprehending. “‘member how i told you i can get somewhere a few seconds early when i make a doorway, if i need to? fuck, i had to use it this time. you were about to throw it.” He says, and kisses you again, holding you close. “goddamn. you can’t do that.” 

“I know.” You whisper. “Toriel wants you to teach me. I barely knew what was happening.” His hands slide around your waist, and he leans into your neck, nipping the skin gently. You recognize that he’s probably been a ball of anxiety about this for hours, that he’s doing what he needs to do to reassure himself that you’re okay, that you’re not going anywhere, so you don’t protest in the slightest, even if he is making it awfully hard to tell him what had happened in his absence. 

“i will.” You feel teeth and bone press against your neck, and you stroke his back slowly. “we can start tomorrow. you need to know how to take care of yourself, anyway. heard what those asshole humans were sayin’.” Well, of course. If he’d jumped back in time to stop you from doing something dumb, he’d heard what had triggered you in the first place. “if people are sayin’ stuff like that to your face, it could get worse. you gotta know how to protect yourself.” He rumbles, and you sigh, feeling so much better tight in his arms. “an’ what crawled up tori’s ass? never seen her like that before?!” He demands after a moment. You kiss the furrow in the bone between his brows, and relay the events of the past few hours to him, with only a few interruptions; two more needy kisses, and one horrified laughing fit that actually sees him significantly calmed down by the end of it. By the time you’re done with your tale, he looks like he’s thinking very hard, but he’s no longer holding you like you might disappear.

“guess we ask asgore, then.” He finally mutters. 

“Guess we do.” You say, feeling much more at ease for having had expressed your concern. 

“no matter what. ‘s got nothing to do with you.” He says firmly. “whatever those humans did, ‘s way in the past.”

“I still need to know.” You say. “You know that saying, right? ‘If you don’t learn your history, you’re doomed to repeat it?’” He snorts.

“yeah, ok, but you really don’t need to worry. you don’t gotta do anything evil to do magic, since you got me an’ my, uh, _’magical ejaculation.’_ ” He gives you a fully insufferable look; he’s equal parts delighted and horrified by Toriel’s reaction to your explanation, and this is probably the fourth time that he’s repeated her specific choice of words since you’d finished telling him. You roll your eyes, and nudge him with your shoulder. 

“You’re enjoying this too much. And yeah. I’m not worried about me. Or even Frisk. Frisk’s a good kid, they’ll be fine no matter what, when they grow up. But if there’s me and Frisk, there’s other people out there who are probably figuring out that they’re a little different, too.” You whisper. “And, I don’t know about you, but I don’t have the brightest view of humanity these days.” He inhales through his teeth, then nods.

“yeah. one more reason to learn what’s up. forewarned, forearmed and all that.” 

“ _Forearmed_ is my specialty.” You laugh, displaying your right arm like it’s a prize on a gameshow or something. He snorts a laugh and steals one last kiss, then murmurs, 

“k. think i’m actually done panicking too. let‘s go help paps and frisk with dinner.” He proposes, and you stand up creakily, then offer him a hand up. He accepts it, then looks earnestly at you. “babe, really. don’t worry too much, no matter what we learn about the mages. i’ve touched your soul. there is not a single evil, bad part of you an’ i know that for a fact. and... i will always be there for you, ok, no matter what. i promise. as long as you’ll have me. promise.” He repeats, and releases your hand, leading the way towards the kitchen, like he hadn’t just promised twice that he’d spend his whole life with you, as long as you wanted him to stay. Like people promised things like that, no big deal, all the time.

Well. The least you could do was take him up on it, you think, walking quietly by his side, a faint smile on your lips and a warmth in your soul that had nothing to do with embarrassment this time.


	74. In Which You Become Really Good At Killing Stuff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've clearly given up at telling you all about fanart that exists
> 
> But you guys
> 
> If you're gonna look at a fanart: 
> 
>  
> 
> [ THIS IS THE ONE ](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/141430579471/artanddetermination-scene-when-reader-ahem)

The rest of the evening is…

Fine. It’s fine. 

“HUMAN. ARE YOU SURE YOU’RE OKAY?” Papyrus insists several times. You suspect he’s watching you just as closely as Sans is right now. You guiltily think that you just don’t give Papyrus enough credit sometimes; he acts young, but he isn’t, really, you’ve gathered that. He’s in his teens at the very least, but… monsters are different, you know that. Sans is a little older than you, but sometimes he acts like he’s ten, other times like he’s a thousand. Papyrus, too, is capable of that ancient, impenetrable stare; at least when the safety of you and your friends is concerned. 

“I’m fine, guys.” You grumble again. You’re feeling a little off-balance, that’s all. You hadn’t expected Toriel to harbor such doubts about you, and now that you’re here, home, feeling safe and like yourself again, you’re irritated that you hadn’t stood up for yourself, snapped that _of course_ you wouldn’t do anything terrible for your new powers. You hadn’t wanted the damn things in the first place, you were just being cheerful about them because, hell, your new family of monsters wouldn’t think highly of you if you acted like you were suddenly saddled with the curse of being like them, right? It wasn’t a curse. It wasn’t. You were just…

“you’re grinding your teeth.” Sans points out. He’s sensitive to stuff like that. Must be a skeleton thing. 

“I’m fine.” He knows that tone. He knows this whole routine. He sighs, and you suspect that he’s going to make you take a walk or do something eminently practical and adult, and you don’t feel like it, so you turn to Frisk and immediately begin playing with a Mon Mothma action figure, directing the Rebel forces to Cloud City for very important reasons. Very important. 

**The Rebels are already _at_ Endor.** Frisk is displeased that you hadn’t paid enough attention to the game, and you stick your tongue out at them. 

“And now they need to go to Cloud City.” You argue half heartedly, feeling Sans’ stare on your back. 

“hey, c’mon.” He says quietly, watching you. “sidebar.” 

“I’m being Mon Mothma.”

“i promise you can go back to being mon mothma. whoever she is.” There’s a hint of humor in his voice, but he’s not taking no for an answer. You grumble again, push yourself to your feet, and allow him to walk you out of Frisk’s room. “hey, let’s go up to the lab.” He suggests, and grouchily, thinking the worst, you comply. He probably wants you way out of the way in case you say something bad about Toriel, you figure. Doesn’t want Frisk to catch on, and who knew how far Frisk could hear, now that Frisk heard you the way they heard monsters, instead of by reading lips. But, upstairs, he immediately heads to one of the windows, and you realize, guiltily, that he’s doing the same thing you do for him. He wants you to see outside, to be reminded that the world is bigger than this. You join him, looking out over the backyard, picking out that part of the bay that Toriel had walked you to earlier. 

“look. i’m not that good at talking. you’re way better at it than me. but i know you’d do this for me.” He says quietly. “lemme help. as much as i can. what’s going on?” He says, and you grimace. 

“...Do you think I’m weak?” You finally mutter. “God, I just couldn’t roll over fast enough when Tori told me to, you know? I felt like L.D., that time he got into the garbage. I couldn’t try to justify myself enough for being what I am. And.. I didn’t ask for any of this. I mean, I’m happy, don’t get me wrong, but…” He sighs, and nods. 

“thought you were being awfully cool with it.” 

“It’s what I was taught to do, Sans.” You say quietly, and he nods again. 

“i know.” Of course he knows. Him too. Seeing Gaster had been enough to put him in a funk all day, so of course he knows, how these familiar, familial triggers, how they can set you off. “can i help?” You turn to look at him, seeing the lights bright in his eyesockets in the dark room. 

“You are helping. I didn’t have to go home to nobody. I didn’t think, back then, that if I didn’t win back her approval, I’d lose everything.” You say, after a moment. “I knew you would be there for me no matter what.” That’s actually kind of huge. Thinking back on the afternoon, he’d picked you over even Toriel in a heartbeat. You never wanted him to have to pick, but it hadn’t been a question in his mind. Had that ever happened before? Not since your parents, surely. You sigh, and scoot over a few inches to lean against him. “I’m sorry. I’m not being very agreeable.” 

“hey, no!” He looks urgently at you. “i didn’t bring you up here to make you apologize! you’re allowed to feel like you do, ‘s ok!” You blink at him, surprised. He looks very seriously at you. “it’s okay to be mad at her.” He repeats. “nobody’s gonna yell at you.” You stare at him for a second, then force your muscles to relax, and kiss the top of his head. 

“You’re wonderful.” You whisper. You’re not entirely sure anyone’s ever said that to you before, and you’re shocked at how much you need that reassurance.

“i’m ok.” He agrees, the barest hint of a smile in his voice. 

\---------------------------------------------

You’re steeled to be assertive, the next morning. You really are. You’d tucked Papyrus and Frisk in, warned them not to stay up all night talking, and, feeling more domestic than you ever had in your life, you’d let Sans take you downstairs to be spectacularly reassuring that he loved you just the way you were, magic or no magic, skarm or no skarm. 

(Well, it had been reassuring until Undyne and Alphys had come home from a date and tipsily heckled you from the other side of the door/armoire situation). 

Still, the next morning, you were totally ready to go show how brave you were, as soon as Toriel and Asgore showed up. Until, well, they didn’t show up. 

“we didn’t set a time.” Sans says at eleven, glancing at the clock. You’re in the TV room, on the sofa, under a blanket and his arm and several layers of concealer, respectively. You glance over at Frisk and Papyrus, who are watching cartoons with twin, rapturous expressions. 

“Yeah. But. Not like Tori to wait so long.” You say quietly. You’ve been getting worried as the time creeps by without any word. 

“i sent a text. no answer.” Sans says, glancing down at his phone. 

“Me too.” You look at Frisk, then curl your knees up under you, pulling your phone out and searching the news anxiously. “One of us should head over.” You decide, finding nothing more than the standard human-monster strife. “Robbery, assault… shoplifting _by_ a monster, that’s new, the message boards love that… Ugh, baby, a little monster kid from Middleton’s gone missing. That’s only two hours from us.”

“saw that. s’ getting worse.” He says, then stands up. “lemme go check. be right back.” He’s about to make a shortcut, when the doorbell rings. “oh. phew.” He offers you a hand up, and the two of you head over to the front door. Toriel and Asgore are standing there, taking up the entire top step. They both look exhausted, and more than a little apologetic. 

“I am so sorry we are so late.” Toriel sighs. “We had some… trouble, last night.” 

“Protestors. Hundreds of them.” Asgore says. “They didn’t do anything, didn’t even go onto my wife’s property, but while they were there, we couldn’t very well leave.” 

“are they gone?” Sans demands, eyes widening. 

“Yes. Eventually they grew overexcited and we were able to call the human police.” You inhale slowly. 

“Come in, come in. Overexcited how?”

“Some of them, dressed all in black, creeping around the back of the house.” Asgore says darkly. “I don’t know what they were planning on doing, but it was enough.” 

“Jeez.” The irritation is miles behind you now. Seeing them there, so tired, knowing how helpless they feel… You can’t help it. You hug Asgore, then Toriel. Toriel squeezes you back so hard that you know she’s saying sorry, too. 

“I am so sorry we did not come here sooner. We have been dealing with human officials all day. They are going to put a patrol on my house. For… diplomatic reasons, they say.” Toriel whispers. Asgore grimaces. 

“Tori, come back to the palace. Please. It’s safe, at least.” He mutters, and she whirls to glare at him. 

“I will see the sky.” She says, deliberately enunciating an argument they’ve clearly had before, and then she looks back at you. 

“Oh. Gosh, um, food’s all ready, come on, let’s eat. You guys need coffee. Or tea.” You remember Asgore’s preference. Sans wraps his arm around protectively around your waist as you usher them inside and to the kitchen, falling still when Toriel taps your shoulder. 

“I owe you an apology.” She whispers, but you shake your head. 

“Forget it, Tori.” 

“I just wish for you to know how much I do trust you. Asgore and I talked last night, and we agreed this was the safest place for Frisk, with you two and Papyrus and Undyne and Alphys and Lesser Dog.” She breathes, and before you can help it, she’s hugging you again - Sans watches you, sees you’re still okay with it, then releases you to let it happen. 

“It’s okay.” You whisper, stroking the soft fur of her neck awkwardly. “Anytime you want us to watch Frisk, we’re happy to do it, you know that? And… forget about yesterday.” This time you mean it. “Tensions were high. We both acted rashly.”

“I certainly did.” She agrees, and looks sorrowfully down at you once she’s let you go. “I had hoped our return to the surface would be different. I had hoped things would no longer be like this.” She whispers. 

Some things never change.

\-------------------------------------------------------------

After brunch, Sans nods at you, then, after a second, at Undyne, who’s been pushing a strawberry around on her plate for the past half-hour while looking dreamily at Alphys. This doesn’t seem fair. She hadn’t had _her_ friends ruining her good night with through-the-door mockery, yesterday!

“c’mon. outside. ________’s gotta know what she’s doing in a fight.”

“What?” Undyne looks startled.

“yeah. we’re practicing magic. and _______ made a spear yesterday so i need your help.” He says. Undyne looks at you, her eye wide. 

“You _did?_ ” She breathes. You have never, not even once, seen her this delighted. 

“was made out of bone.” Sans chimes in quickly, looking to nip this in the bud. 

“STILL.” She gives Sans her sharpest, wildest grin. “Okay! Oh my god, what a great day, yes! Yes! We are totally doing this!” You look warily at her, then at Asgore and Toriel, who are observing this with a level of detached tolerance - well, Toriel is downright smiling. Asgore looks a little unsettled, but he nods deeply after a moment, meeting your eyes. Is this your moment? Should you ask him-

“c’mon, babe. let’s do this. nice outside.” Sans urges, and Undyne gives you such a huge-eyed, delighted expression that you laugh and nod. 

“Sure. Let’s see if I can pull that off again.” 

\-------------------------------------------------

It’s definitely tougher with an audience. 

“C’mon!” Undyne heckles. “Get mad, punk!” 

“I’m not mad, though! I like you!” You complain. You’ve been out here for an hour no. No spear. There’s got to be a trick to it, like Frisk had showed you to see souls, but for the life of you, you can’t figure it out. 

“‘s okay. you’ll get it-”

“SANS!” Undyne roars. He turns to glare at her. 

“what!?”

“Stop it! You’re calming her down!” She snaps. “God, I have no idea what’s going on in your skull, the way Paps tells it, you used to need to be pushed into a fight basically by force! Whatever happened on the surface to make you so ready to fight needs to happen to her, so stand down!”

“hey.” He looks irritated. “i got out and i had something to fight for, that’s all-”

“OH.” You look at him with wide eyes. “No, I got it!”

“What?” Undyne needs to know, but you just close your eyes, thinking about lying on your back in the backyard in the snow, Ghost clinging to you, half your arm missing, the pain, the men in black, the threat to your family, your friends, your new life, the thought that Undyne and Papyrus and Sans were putting their lives at risk, that Frisk and Alphys were in the basement cowering-

-you push-

“THERE IT IS!” Undyne crows, and leans to jeer at Sans. “See. Great coach. Great, great coach. Oh, Sans, look at how pointy it is!” 

“yeah, yeah.” Sans grumbles, but he looks pleased with you all the same. “k. throw it at the target, babe.” 

Papyrus has been working very hard making snow sculptures for you to aim at, in spite of the heat of this warm-for-January, warm-even-for-April day, which is making all the snow skeletons droop grotesquely. He’s even, thoughtfully, jammed a tomato in the center of each one for you to aim for. 

(“THAT’S THE SOUL!” He’d cackled.)

You try to focus all those protective feelings on the “soul” in question. Your spear makes it, oh, halfway, before burying itself, tip first, in the soft snow and soil in front of you. 

“i don’t get it.” Sans mutters next to you. “you did it before?” You turn to stare at him. 

“I did?” He winces, and glances away. 

“uh, the spear thing.” He says, too fast, and you wonder, for the first time… what had he prevented, by skipping back in time to stop you from hurting those women? What had he actually seen? 

You manage to summon another spear, but as the afternoon goes on, and your audience grows larger and larger, your efforts only grow weaker. Everyone notices, of course. By the end, Undyne says something. 

“Uh, is she running out of magic, you think? I mean, should you guys…?” She trails off, waggling her eyebrows. In the background, Toriel chokes, quietly and politely, on her cup of tea. 

“OKAY.” You grumble. “I AM DONE FOR THE DAY.” You don’t think you’re anywhere near being out of magic, you just think that you weren’t really designed to try to, well, kill people with a spear! Undyne trades a glance with Alphys, then huffs, sighs, and says, 

“Okay. There’s always tomorrow.” You narrow your eyes at her, then turn to Sans, waiting for him to lecture you about not trying hard enough. He doesn’t, of course. He gives you a reassuring smile, then looks down at his phone. 

“you did great today.” He assures you, then sighs. “i also feel compelled to tell you this. capra wants to know if we want to go on a double date tonight. newish bar, owned by monster friendly humans.” He mutters. Behind him, Asgore suddenly perks up, distracted from whatever Frisk was trying to explain about Star Wars. 

“You should go.” He urges. “I keep telling you, the more we know about this man, the better.” Sans raises both browbones delicately. 

“yeah. but this is our free time. not work.” He says, and you can hear the sarcasm that he desperately wants to let in his voice - damn, Sans is still not fond of Asgore!

“Let’s go.” You say quickly. Sans looks at you, confused. “I could use a drink.” And, well, you could use Asgore feeling like he owes you one, so you could find out what Toriel was so worried about when she saw you using magic! You’d seen him, all afternoon, looking more and more relieved as he realized you posed no real offensive threat, and damn it, you want to know why!

“heh. k. i guess i’ll tell him to expect us. we’d better go get ready.” Sans sounds slightly surprised, but he rolls with this particular punch smoothly. 

“And we’d better say our goodbyes.” Asgore says. You sigh, hugging Asgore, Toriel and Frisk in turn. You don’t want them to leave after what had happened last night, for Frisk’s sake at the very least. Still. They couldn’t cower or hide out and you knew that. And Asgore was powerful, and you and Sans could be at their side in a heartbeat, and - 

“you comin’?” You’d fallen behind everyone as they filtered back into the mansion, thinking. 

“Yeah. Sorry. Coming.” You assure him, and trot inside, apprehensive for what kind of double date Capra has in store. 

\-----------------------------------------------

“The Cock and Bull.” You stand outside the bar at the base of Mt. Ebott, feeling wholly skeptical. It’s brand new, but it somehow looks worn down, like there’s been a lot of fights here. And the name! “Sans. Are you sure-”

“‘s what he said!” Sans laughs. “don’t start blamin’ me for this, you’re the one who wanted to go-”

“You’re such a little shit.” You grumble, staring at the sign again. 

“‘s why you love me.” He purrs, and leans up to kiss you so sweetly that you can barely keep your balance in the slight heels of your boots. 

“...Goddamn it, Sans.” You breathe.

“not too late to turn back.” He murmurs in your ear - 

“Oh, there you are!” Capra’s voice, sudden and familiar, greets you as the door to the bar swings open. 

“well, now it is.” Sans says smoothly. “hey capra.” Capra’s wearing a black t-shirt and jeans, which seems fully unnatural. He should be wearing a suit, he’s always been formal - damn it, what had he looked like when he was babysitting you, you can only imagine him in a suit but it doesn’t seem right-

“She alright?” Capra squints at you. 

“long day.” Sans slides his skeletal fingers through your own, then gives Capra a hard look. Capra, to his credit, doesn’t ignore it. He clears his throat, then says, 

“Let me reiterate the following apology. ________, I never should have touched your arm without your permission. I gather that what I did was particularly rude, and I extra apologize for that, and will be buying all your drinks for the night in recompense, et cetera. Also, you can each ask me one favor and I will comply within reason. Also, ______, I got you a fish tank for your office. I hope you like dwarf puffers.” You grin in spite of yourself. Goddamn it. 

“I do.” You sigh. “Who’s your date, Capra?” 

“Awfully formal!” He barks out a laugh. “Thought you called me Peter!” 

“capra just rolls right off the tongue, though.” Sans smirks, though he seems to have thawed to Capra, probably because of the damn aquarium thing (or more specifically, how happy it’s obviously made you). Capra grins. 

“She’s a model. She’s lovely. I think.” He says with a lazy shrug. 

“you think?” 

“Well, I just met her the other night. I’m not sure of her, uh, personality.” He admits. You raise an eyebrow. 

“...Did you invite us out to be a buffer?” You drawl, and he shrugs again, grinning. 

“Sans told me I should work on human contact. I’m working on it.” 

“i, uh, meant that figuratively.” Sans grumbles, then looks at you. “dunno about you, babe, but i need a drink.”

“I need seven.” You say flatly, and open the door for them. 

Inside is, frankly, ridiculous. You’ve gotten the handle of this place now. It desperately wants to be the cool, dangerous bar that the people in the know hang out at, but it’s done absolutely nothing to earn its reputation. The graffiti on the walls looks fake. The names carved into the bar look faker. 

The brunette human sitting at the bar looks fakest of all. 

Her eyes widen slightly as you approach. “Oh! Peter! Are these your… friends?” You don’t like the way she says that word. Neither does Sans; he stiffens at your side. But even more clearly, Capra shares your boyfriend's distaste. He stops short and looks at the two of you, then back at her. 

“Yes. They are.” He says, soft and even and dangerous. 

“May I talk to you, outside, for a second?” The woman gives you both a huge, fake smile, then locks eyes with Capra again. Capra stares at her with disgust, then nods. 

“Sit here.” He tells the both of you. “I’ll be right back.” You glance at Sans, grit your teeth, then settle down at the bar. 

“doesn’t seem like she was expecting monsters.” He notes. 

“I’m not a monster.” You say, testing out the thought, and he gives you a quick, apologetic smile. 

“uh, no. you’re not. an’ neither am i, i guess, but it’s what people see.” He says, and reaches forwards to run his fingers against the exposed bone of your arm. 

“Mmm.” You agree, trying not to get distracted - it feels so damn good when he does that! You’re cut short by Capra reappearing. 

“So.” He clears his throat. “Looks like it’s just the three of us this evening.” You look up at him, suddenly realizing what had just happened. 

“God, Peter, I’m sorry-” 

“Don’t be.” He says quickly. “I don’t want that shit in my life. Drinks? We need drinks. Lots of drinks.” 

“uh, we need to work tomorrow.” Sans points out. Capra snorts. 

“Well, _I_ need drinks to get over the fact that I’ve slept with a racist, and I’m your boss, technically, so you won’t be in trouble if you’re late or hungover and… scotch? Can we do scotch?” He looks eagerly up at the human bartender, blue eyes practically crackling with urgency. 

“what’s scotch?” 

With that question, Sans consigns the rest of the night to being an utter disaster. 

\---------------------------------------------

“Lacrosse.”

“Basketball.” 

“No. But, lacrosse takes skill.”

“You mean money. Lacrosse takes money.” You protest. 

“guys? what’s lacrosse?” 

\------------------------------------------------

“Princess Diaries.” 

“Shut up, Capra, you can’t even have an Anne Hathaway opinion anymore.” 

“That makeover, though.”

“SHE WAS OBVIOUSLY ALREADY BEAUTIFUL!”

“...guys?”

\----------------------------------------------

“Zeppelin.”

“Ramones.” 

“Zeppelin.” 

“Ramones!”

“guys. please. i don’t know these things.” Sans begs. You clear your throat. 

“Led Zeppelin is too fancy. Capra likes -” You pause to take a gulp of beer, “pretentious bullshit.” 

“Pretentious bullshit, my ass. Jimmy Page was a masterpiece. Shining god. Aspirational human. Finest of all men. ‘Over The Hills And Far Away?’” Capra attempts. “‘STAIRWAY????’” 

“BLITZKRIEG BOP?” You halfway yell in return, and Sans, who holds his liquor much better than you, dissolves into something that, on a less controlled person, might have been called giggles. 

“ok. ok. it sounds great. both of you stop yelling.” He laughs, sliding his arm around your waist. Capra eyes him. 

“Y-You don’t even know! Hang on.” Slightly weaving, he heads to the jukebox on the wall. You turn to look at Sans. 

“He’s fun.” You sigh. 

“i know.” He laughs. 

“I like him.” You admit. 

“i know, me too.” He snickers, and leans close for a kiss. “i like you more, though.” 

“Mmm, same.” You lean up to meet invisible lips, and stay there for a while, until the sound of the Ramones jerks you to attention. Goddamn it. He’d actually played your favorite song before his own. 

…If he was an evil mastermind, you didn’t know what you were going to do.

Just then he comes bounding forward, a eager labrador looking for your attention. 

“Hey! Do you guys know, um, Ice Wolf?” He asks, glancing over his shoulder. At the jukebox, a tall, white, ridiculously buff wolf is standing, searching through the songs. 

“uh. i do. good guy. strong silent type.” Sans says, arching an eyebrow. 

“Good. Excellent. That is the type I want.” Capra says, and drains his glass of staggeringly expensive scotch. “He invited me back to see his den. I can’t wait to see how weird that is. Are there posters? Is there a bed? Oh. Don’t tell me. I want to do this on my own. Oh god, I’m so excited. I was going to keep plying you guys with alcohol until you did teleportation stuff with me but this seems more fun. But, hey, my tab’s open as long as you want. Oh! ______!” He grabs your attention, then falls silent as Blitzkrieg Bop fades out. 

“Uh, yeah?” You attempt. He pauses for a second, then nods as the next song starts up. 

“This one’s for you.” The familiar guitar lick starts as he walks back towards the wolf. It’s Kashmir. Led Zeppelin. Oh goddamn it. 

“I’m so mad at him, that what he just did was awesome.” You grumble. Sans nods. 

“...this is a good song, though.” He mutters. It really is. 

“D’you think he really likes monsters?” You say, eyeing the amber liquor at the bottom of your glass. Sans hesitates, then nods. 

“sure. but, do you think he’s a good guy?” You shrug, after a second. 

“I’m not sure who’s a good guy anymore.” You admit. “I thought Tori would be one, but she pushed me away. I mean, I get why she did it, but still… Meanwhile, I get the sense Capra would probably kill a whole continent to get a taste of my magic.” 

“hey. i’m the only one who gets a taste of that.” Sans says, suddenly protective. You wink at him - oh, good, drunk you is a winker. 

“Mhm. Want a taste now? S’ gotta be parts of my arm you haven’t licked yet.” 

“oh my god, be louder.” He snorts sarcastically, but his eyes are as bright as you’ve ever seen them. He whips out his phone, and you lean over his shoulder to watch him type, “capra, you weirdo, you leave these people a huge tip” before he takes your hand and takes a step and the two of you spill onto your bed.

And it’s not such a terrible or tough day, after all.


	75. In Which Capra Is Perfectly Happy With All The Things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! So TST got picked for ... jury duty? Because of course she did? So if you haven't noticed that my updates are a little sporadic, they are, and that's why. Also because I'm job hunting. Also because, I'm me.   
> Also because I love u.

By the time the two of you get to work the next day, the foggy feeling in your head has receded into a mild annoyance. You could definitely be feeling worse. You could definitely be feeling better, too, but hey, things weren’t so bad. And Sans was certainly chipper.

“What are you so happy about?” You yawn, rubbing your eyes and stepping through the portal he’d just traced to the woods just outside EbbCo. “Mmmph, sorry Spot.” You add quietly, at the expected screech of complaint. Sans ambles through, smirking. 

“maybe i just had a good night last night.” He drawls, and you shake your head slowly. 

“Well, sure. But I don’t think that’s it.” You say, and he grins, admitting it. 

“k. yeah. i’m back to work in the labs with capra today.” 

“And?” You arch an eyebrow, nudging him until he closes the door behind you. 

“...and he’s probably gonna be really hungover and i’m looking forward to being annoying.” He admits with a shrug, and you grin at him, then yawn, as the two of you stroll towards the front doors of the building. You’re only maybe fifteen or so minutes late, and technically, you could have been on time, but Sans had insisted, vehemently in fact, that since Capra had said that he’d understand if you were late, that you were going to be late. Fifteen minutes had been a compromise. You’d not wanted to look terrible on your second day, after all, but he’d pouted, and that was hard to resist. 

“Mmm, okay. Have fun. Just, you know, not too mean, babe. He is, technically, our employer.” You tell him, pushing the door open. 

“yeah, yeah.” He says, and glances around the lobby. “weird. he normally waits for me.” He honestly looks a little put out, which makes you snicker. 

“Aw, sorry baby. I guess you’ll have to do actual work until he shows up.” 

“lame.” He sighs, and leans forward, pressing both elevator buttons halfheartedly. Yours, going up, arrives first. “meet me for lunch?”

“Sure. Come on up to my office.” You offer, and he grins. 

“later.” He leans through the elevator doors before they close to grab a quick kiss. The receptionist (a human this time - she must be Gloria’s backup) giggles quietly at your antics before the door closes. You grit your teeth, reminding yourself of your previous resolution; that you don’t want to be all over each other at the office, at the very least. Maybe Undyne had a point. 

...Maybe you should have lunch somewhere less private. 

You’re expecting a warm welcome on the fourth floor again, but when you arrive, you can’t help but notice that everyone’s awfully quiet, giving you just small smiles or waves as you walk over to your corner office. In fact, they keep glancing nervously at the door. Oh, you don’t like that. 

Opening the door, you immediately discover why. 

“Capra. Get out of my chair.” You grumble. Capra winces. He’s managed to prop his head up when you walk in, but the rest of his torso is collapsed across your desk. He is in _bad_ shape.

“How are you so perky right now?” He mumbles. He’s got a five o’ clock shadow, and his hair, for once, is in disarray. It is supremely unfair that he manages to make even this look very good. 

“I drank water last night. Did you drink water?” You lecture, leaning against your desk and looking down at the pitiful sight that is your boss, and perhaps your friend. 

“Water. Right.” He mumbles. “I thought that instead of water, you were supposed to drink _more_ liquor. Cancels the first few rounds out. Transitive property. Math.” 

“Capra.” You sigh. You are certain that isn’t what the transitive property is. 

“I had other things on my mind.” He groans. “Water was a low priority. I need you to hide me from your boyfriend.”

“What?” You’re thrown by the whiplash change of subject. 

“Look, he’s going to be super annoying and I can’t handle that right now.” He mumbles, resting his head back down on your desk. “Look. ______. Look at your fish.” He gestures vaguely in the corner, where you notice a large, fairly spectacular fishtank. “See? See how nice I am? Let me hide. Love me.” He begs, and you snort. 

“Do your other employees know you’re like this?” 

“No, they think I’m scolding you for being late.” He mumbles onto your desk. You glare at him. It takes him several seconds to notice. “I could correct their misapprehension.” He sighs, and you nod. 

“You can hide. I actually want to do the thing you’re paying me for, though, so I can either get you a chair, or, you know, you can lie on the ground.” You offer. He groans, making a vague gesture at the door that you think means ‘chair,’ so you step out, retrieving one from an empty cubicle and carrying it clumsily back into the room. He looks so pathetic that you leave once again, going to the break room to get him a big glass of water (and a cup of coffee for yourself) 

By the time you’re back, he’s snoring, tilted back in your chair. You think about waking him, think about if you really actually want him to be awake, and then scoot the chair on the other side of the desk, swivelling around to look at your parents’ huge collection of books. After studying the spines for a while, you begin to realize that there’s a loose sort of organization; by subject, then by age. The oldest books are on the top shelves, the newest at the bottom. The books by your new fish tank are histories, which seems like the right place to start. You roll over, and begin surveying the selection.

Gah, how do you even begin with this? After a while, you just give up and grab one at random. The chapter denoting the history of the magical war has been carefully denoted with an aging post-it note. You flip it open, roll back to your desk, and begin to read. 

It’s nothing new. None of the first ten or so books you flip through are. They all say the same things; humans and monsters reached an impasse for unknown reasons, great war, massive casualties on both sides. Something had drawn the few remaining monsters to the base of Mt. Ebott, and there, the final battle had pushed them underground, the barrier had been erected - there was the least amount of information about how that had happened - and the barrier had remained for at least two thousand years. Nothing you didn’t already know. 

You’re getting frustrated by the time you spot four or five books off on their own, demarcated by a post-it that’s been bleached from years of sun. It bears a single, pointed, question mark. 

“Oh, that looks promising.” You mutter to yourself.

“Mhhh?”

“GAH!” You’d forgotten Capra was there. “Nothing. Look. Old books!”

“Entire room is full of old books.” He says, looking at you through a crack in his eyelids. 

“But these ones have a question mark on them!” You’re being particularly perky right now on purpose, and he clearly doesn’t like it. Sans was right. Annoying Capra is fun. 

“Ah.” He tilts up and begins sipping at the glass of water you’d fetched, as you pull the first one down. 

“Oh.” You sigh, flipping a page open. “I understand the question mark now. I have literally no idea what language this is in.” It looks more like code than any writing you’re used to. How old was this book?

“So use magic.” Capra says off-handedly, lurching over to take a gulp of your coffee too. 

“Goddamn it, why does everyone keep stealing my coffee? And, look, magic doesn’t work like that, I can’t just immediately understand something just because-” The thought of Frisk’s speech pops, unbidden, into your mind. “...God _damn_ it!” You growl, hating that he might be right, and you look back at the page again. 

“Whatcha doin’?” Capra is all attention now. “Buddy. Buddy. You doing magic?”

You grit your teeth once again. You’re really not supposed to be doing magic, but… damn it, you need to know this stuff, and it’s not _real_ magic, is it, it’s not like teleporting or Spot or spears or anything!

“I’m seeing if I can interpret. Be quiet.” You scold distractedly, looking back down to the page. How had it worked with Frisk? Sure, you’d had that soul to soul connection or something, but that’s not what Sans had said about how they spoke, Sans had said that monsters just automatically understood, that language wasn’t a barrier. And, god, if you were going to be called a monster by everyone, you’d better at least have this particular perk, you think sarcastically, squinting at the page.

For a second, the words seem to come into focus, into something that’s almost resolution, and then Sans comes strolling in, grinning, before he takes in the scene in front of him. 

“have you been _hiding_ him?” He says indignantly, staring at you.

“He was in really bad shape!” You protest, while Capra cringes at the sound of Sans’ voice. 

“my own girlfriend. a traitor.” Sans grumbles, looking at the two of you. “‘s lunchtime, anyway.” 

“Two seconds. Sans, can you read this?” You nod at the book. His brows raise, but he heads to your side and looks down. 

“ouch. hurts my brain.” He says, after a moment. “well, not brain. whatever. um… i think the first sentence is something about ‘history’ and ‘magical abilities?’” He looks down at you and you nod. 

“Yeah, I thought so too.” 

“Cooooool.” Capra looks between the two of you, eyes alight. Sans gives him a very unhappy look. 

“they’re wonderin’ where you are, downstairs.” 

“That’s fine. Air of mystery. Important in a CEO.” He says, and you roll your eyes. 

“I’m pretty sure that’s not a thing. Capra, we’re gonna take lunch. Are you, you know, okay?” He looks up at the two of you again, his most pathetic expression on his face. 

“Where are you guys going?” He wants to know. You look at Sans. 

“Babe, I was thinking we should eat at home. I want to let Spot out for a while.” 

“fine by me.” He says with a shrug. Capra continues to look between the two of you, just… _hoping._ Sans observes this, then looks at you. You’re beginning to feel the tiniest bit bad. Poor Capra, so involved with magic, so invested, and he’s not even allowed to see a little? Sans sees that you’re cracking, and shakes his head. “oh, no.” 

“He’d be fine.” You say weakly. 

“He’d be great!” Capra chimes in, eyes wide. Sans looks at you for a long moment, then groans. 

“i get the sense that i’m really gonna regret this.” He mutters. “ok. fuck. capra, no blabbing about this. and. _don’t_ touch the edges.” He says, very firmly. Capra bolts to his feet, his hangover suddenly miles behind him. 

“Is this happening?!” He says eagerly. 

“‘gainst my better judgment, yeah.” Sans grumbles, and very quickly, traces a door. “just… walk through. no poking at it. no questions.”

“WHAT?” Capra is staring at the doorway into your kitchen with wild delight. 

“capra!” Sans sounds irritable enough that Capra gets the message, and apprehensively approaches the doorway. 

“I… just step through?” He mutters, and you nod quickly. 

“Just like walking.” You reassure him. He hesitates for only a second, then steps through the doorway onto the polished hardwood of your kitchen floor. 

“Holy. Shit.” He whispers, and whirls around in time to see you stepping through. “You guys. Holy shit. I have so many-”

“i said no questions.” Sans growls, stepping through behind you. “babe, this might have been really dumb.” 

“He already knew we could do it.” You reason, shrugging. “Capra, what kind of sandwich do you want?” 

He stands there, bewildered, as the door winks out of existence behind Sans. For a second, all you can see is the thousands of wheels turning in his head, the ideas churning and twisting so rapidly that he can’t be bothered to respond, to think about anything but the enormity of something that already seemed so normal for you. Then suddenly, the moment stops, and he slaps a wide, slightly maniacal grin on his face. 

“Grilled cheese.” 

Three grilled cheeses later, you step outside. Capra’s been very good about not asking anything about the magic he’d just witnessed, but you see him elbow Sans’ side as you hold the sandwich in your left hand and concentrate. 

“What’s she doin’?” 

“lettin’ her pet out to play.” Sans says, a slightly maniacal grin on _his_ face now. He clearly doesn’t mind Capra seeing this particular display of magic - not that you can blame him, when you think about it. Nobody would want to fuck with the human who could call forth something like Spot, he’s clearly thinking. You roll your eyes at him, and think harder, delicately cutting a window into the void.

Spot comes bounding out, all energetic delight, and immediately hovers to your side, bobbing slightly in the air as she nuzzles you thoroughly. It’s enough to almost put you off balance, but you plant your legs and laugh as she greets you, reaching out to scratch her nose. 

“What the hell…” Capra mutters quietly to himself.

Spot snaps to attention.

She whirls away from you, quickly moving between you and Capra, and the lights in her eyes are wild, urgent, quickly turning bluer and bluer. 

“oh. shit.” Sans says, just as you simultaneously say,

“Spot! NO!” Her jaw is opening, displaying teeth the size of butcher knives, and there’s a sense of magic, of energy, being drawn in, concentrating-

**“NO!”** You yell again, and she finally hears you; her jaws snap shut, and she turns one huge, wild eye towards you. “He’s a friend.” You assure her, and she huffs quietly, then turns to press up against your side again. The feeling of gathering magic slowly fades into nothing. 

Capra is chalk white, staring at you and Spot like he’s never seen anything quite like you. Sans, on the other hand, is staring at Capra. 

“bud.” He says, after a moment. “she, uh, _really_ doesn’t like you.” His eye sockets narrow slightly, and he gives a wide, false grin at Capra, the lights in his eyes hard. Capra swallows, and nods, but Sans isn’t done. He looks Capra over once more, and then, very, very casually, takes a big bite of his sandwich. He swallows, then smiles even wider, looking at you and Spot, a few feet away. 

“what does that say about you, i wonder?” He muses quietly.


	76. In Which We Learn A Really Significant Truth By Looking At Souls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope the Easter Bunny brought you all exactly what you deserved.  
> Coal.  
> I don't know how holidays work.  
> [Love me.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
> 

Capra looks really, spectacularly unhappy at the moment. Which, well, is kind of funny, but it’s not exactly fair. 

“Sans.” You clear your throat. Sans raises an eyebrow. “Spot doesn’t particularly like _you_ either, remember?” You point out, then, unable to stop yourself from teasing him for his dramatic tone, add; “So. What does that say about you, I wonder?” 

“uh. heh.” He kicks at a piece of snow, suddenly looking a thousand times less menacing. “nothin’ about me. just means that spot’s a little overprotective of you.” 

“A skeletal being who’s overprotective of me. Goodness gracious never have I heard of such a thing.” You drawl in a monotone voice, then sigh, looking at Capra. “I’m really sorry, Peter. Spot’s never seen a male human, I guess. She’s okay with my little cousin getting close to me, but she doesn’t like anyone she thinks might pose a threat, I think.” Spot huffs quietly at your side, and you scratch her nose again. Capra blinks, taking all of this in. 

“She’s not like other monsters.” He says slowly, and you sigh and nod. 

“Not exactly a monster. Wanna meet her?” He looks warily at you. “She’s not gonna do anything, now that she knows you’re a friend. C’mon.” You urge. Sans looks at you again, a brow raised. 

“you sure?” He says, and you know he’s not asking if you’re sure that Spot won’t hurt Capra. He’s wondering if you should really be teaching Spot that Capra’s a friend. 

“Yeah. She listens to me.” You say, answering both questions. You’re certain that you’re Spot’s first priority. If you told her to go after Capra, she would in a heartbeat, as far as you can tell. Sans hesitates, then laughs quietly. 

“yeah. ‘m sure you’re right. i mean… _look_ at him!” He nods pointedly at Capra, who’s still standing there like he doesn’t know what to do with his limbs right now. It is always delightful to see him looking out of sorts, if only because it doesn’t happen nearly often enough. You try not to giggle, then catch the meaning in Sans’ voice. _Look_ at him. You narrow your eyes slightly, and Capra’s soul comes flickering into view. 

You have to slap your hand to your mouth quickly to avoid from bursting out in laughter. 

“What?!” Capra demands, and you almost lose it again. You have seen souls of every color, by now. It’s still not second nature to look for them, but every now and then it occurs to you to figure it out when you’re talking to a new person. You’ve seen dull, dirty souls like Paula’s and you’ve seen souls just as bright and vibrant as Frisk’s, or Sans’ (or yours, Sans would point out), but this was the first one… oh god. 

His soul was a damn _mirror_ , shiny, metallic silver with maybe the slightest hint of purple. How vain did you have to be, for your soul to be a mirror!? He’s looking skeptically at you, his head tilted, and you have to struggle valiantly not to giggle. “C’mon. Don’t look at me like that.” He’s grumbling. “It’s not like I pissed myself or anything. Which I would have been entitled to. Just for the record. Giant ass skull charging its damn hyper beam…”

“Is that a Pokemon reference?” You demand, and Sans snorts quietly from next to Capra. Capra sighs, then nods at Spot, who’s still begging for scratches. 

“She’ll be friendly? You’re sure?” 

“well, she probably won’t hurt ya, at least.” Sans snickers, making his way to your side and offering you the rest of his sandwich. You frown at him. 

“Sans…” 

“full.” He says, and, when you won’t take it from him, he leans forward to feed it to Spot. She accepts it in one delicate bite, and deigns to let Sans scratch her jaw, though her big eyes are fixed on Capra as he cautiously approaches. 

“This is Peter, Spot. He’s our friend. You be gentle with him.” You coo at her, making sure that you’re thinking this very clearly as well - you’re still not sure if she understands you when you speak, or if she’s hearing your thoughts on some level. Spot whuffs, but her eyes travel from Capra to the sandwich in his hand. He notices this, his eyes busy. 

“Can I feed her too?” He asks, holding the sandwich up. Spot follows it with her gaze, and you chuckle. 

“Sure, why not. Wasn’t like I toiled over a hot stove making those or anything.” 

“I’ll order us delivery when we get back to the office.” He takes it for granted that you’ll be partaking in this delivery, of course. Capra was certainly vain, but he didn’t suffer from a lack of generosity. “Here, girl.” He says, taking a step closer, and holds the mostly uneaten sandwich out. Spot glances at you, and when you nod, she takes it carefully between her teeth - Capra seems to be trying not to shake as she does so - then gulps it down, before looking at Capra with a much more inquisitive light in her eyes. 

“Go on. She likes it when you scratch her nose.” You urge. Capra tenses for a second, then very slowly raises his hand, reaching forward -

“he looks like hiccup tryin’ to make friends with toothless.” Sans points out, at your side. You giggle, glancing away for a second to give him a big grin - he’s not wrong, but you have a more important question:

“When did you even see that movie?”

“Guys, not that this isn’t a fascinating digression, but can we talk about this later?” Capra complains quietly, and finally finds his nerve. “Please don’t kill me, please don’t kill me…” He mutters quietly under his breath as he closes the distance and carefully runs his fingers across the smooth bone of Spot’s snout. Spot holds still for a moment, and then, making a very soft grumble, she inches forward so Capra can scratch her better. Capra releases a held breath, then slowly smiles at the giant beast, sliding his fingertips along the soft curve of her snout. “So your name’s Spot, huh?” He murmurs, a soft tone that you’ve never heard from him before. “Aren’t you beautiful. Such a pretty, smart girl… yes you are. Yes you are!” He coos, and Spot slowly inches closer and closer, until she’s leaning against him properly, begging for more scratches. 

Sans watches this skeptically, his browbones raised. “is there a damn thing in this universe he can’t charm?” He murmurs to you, and Capra barks out a laugh, overhearing him. 

“Other than you two?” He says, his eyebrows darting upwards just enough to make sure that you both catch the flirty innuendo. It seems to be more or less a reflex with him - you’ve already noticed that the more out of sorts or frustrated a normal person would be, the more likely that Capra will respond with a heavy dose of seductive flattery. 

“You’re ridiculous. Didn’t you have a good time with Ice Wolf last night, anyway? Why don’t you start your _own_ couple instead of being totally jelly of this one?!” You scold, and then whistle at Spot. “C’mon girl. Time to go home.” Spot gives you a baleful look. “Yes, already.” You say sternly, and nod at the tiny scrap of void you’ve left open, slowly slicing reality back open for her. Capra clears his throat. 

“I had a fine time with Ice Wolf. Thank you for finally asking. Unfortunately, it turned out that when he asked me to see his den, he meant it in like the ‘alternate word for a living room’ sense. It was just in a house. I was looking for more weirdness. It turned out to be a perfectly pleasant and polite hookup. Boring. Also, much more importantly, I, um, I know I’m not supposed to ask questions. I know. But. Please. Just one. Where the hell is that?” He’s staring into the void, his eyes wide. For once, there’s no pretense in his voice or expression as he stares forward. “That’s not anywhere on Earth.” He says, a mixture of dread and disbelief in his voice as his eyes struggle to take in the nausea inducing twist of shapes and colors on the other side of the doorway. Spot grumbles as she glides through, and Sans hesitates, glances at you, and raises an eyebrow once more. 

“what do you think?” He asks, and you shrug. 

“It’s up to you, Sans. That’s not my secret or my story, you know?” He shakes his head, looking at your arm. 

“i dunno about that.” He mutters, suddenly quite serious, and you have to agree, now that you think about it. You’d earned access to that place at the exact same time that you had felt your arm disintegrate into smooth, hard bone.

“Still.” You say, nodding at him before you seal the doorway to the void. “It’s up to you, baby.” Sans studies Capra, thinking hard, then grunts. 

“we’ll talk when we get back to work.” He decides. “theoretical stuff, okay? i’ve just been thinkin’ about your problem about the scaling for the thermal energy conversion and i’ve been figuring some places where we could really increase efficiency, when asgore gives us the go-ahead.” Capra’s eyes light up, and you can hear the intake of his breath. 

“Sans, buddy, go easy on me with that kinda talk. I can only get so hard.” He says quietly, beginning to show his teeth in one of his most wolfish grins yet. You laugh, then you roll your eyes at him

“How have you not been sued yet?! Did you even watch that sexual harassment video?!”

“People love me.” He says with a shrug. “And besides, look who’s talking, I’m not the one who snuck off her first day on the job for a quickie.” You immediately open your mouth to protest, indignant and more than a little guilty, but he shakes his head, “Please, I can always tell. Sixth sense. It’s a gift, really. Plus, the big guy here didn’t complain at all about me taking you to lunch, so he must have been in a prettttttty good mood. And… when you _teleported_ back into your office, your sweater was on inside out.” You groan quietly, your cheeks heating and Sans coughs - you suspect very strongly he’s doing so to hide a snicker. “Now, I’ve got some fairly significant skeleton dick questions, but we can totally cover those later. Sans, you really think King Asgore will lift the ban?” Capra immediately changes the subject, and Sans hesitates, looking first to see if he’s in trouble with you, then shrugs. 

“don’t get too excited. i don’t have any insider info, pal. but… you keep up your end of the deal, keep bein’ good to monsters, who knows? maybe asgore will make an example to all the other humans, give ebbco permission-”

“Oh god, I am literally about to...” He glances at you, and cuts himself off from whatever ridiculous thing he’d been about to say, deciding again on a broad wink before he presses onward. “But you think that whatever magic _that_ was, that could help us with the scaling issue?” 

“i think it’s what my d-” Sans cuts himself off quickly, looking at the eager way Capra’s watching him, and shakes his head. “the scientist who designed the core, think that’s how he did it. we can run some numbers, try to make a model-” 

“Oh fuck yes.” They both look terribly pleased with the prospect. 

“Oh my god, you’re such nerds.” You sigh, and lean forward to kiss Sans’ cheek to soften the blow a little. “Are we ready to go back, then? I want to get back to work on that weird book.” Sans grins up at you, fully acknowledging that he’s a nerd, and then nods. 

“s’pose so.” You shrug, and then reach out, slicing a doorway back to your office. 

(“ _Fuck_ , that’s cool.” Capra groans, the jealousy thick in his voice.)

“Goodness!” There’s another person in the office, who sounds terribly startled by the sudden portal and burst of cold air. You wince, stepping through and recognizing the culprit. 

“Oh, jeez, Doris! Sorry! I didn’t expect anyone would be in here!” The tiny, elderly woman has her hand on her heart, looking very taken aback by the fact that you’d just stepped out of thin air. Capra steps through a second later, already looking like he did this sort of thing all the time. He spots Doris immediately, and gives her a very slick smile. 

“Oh hey, Doris. Sorry. I was just coming back from my friends’ house.” He says, his voice dripping casualness. She stares at the portal for a second longer, then, managing to compose herself, gives Capra a mildly chiding look just as Sans steps through. 

“You’ve been missing all day, Mr. Capra. People have been looking for you. I heard a rumor you might be in here.” Her glance moves almost imperceptibly to you, and for a second, you rethink how wise it might have been to spend all morning locked up in an office alone with Peter Capra. People certainly did _talk,_ after all. Capra nods seriously, and says, 

“I was assisting _______ with her research. You do remember ________, don’t you, Doris?” 

“Very distinctly, Mr. Capra.” Doris says, her voice dryer than ever. She sounds perfectly professional, but at the same time it’s clear that Capra is getting scolded. “In any event, I just wanted to tell you that your four-o-clock cancelled. Also, Gloria called in for the rest of the week, so Betty’s at front desk and she needs the credentials for late night access.” Capra stares at her, lost for words. 

“Doris. You’re not going to say anything about the fact that my friends and I just stepped through a goddamn portal into this room? It just hasn’t occurred to you that this is, just maybe, noteworthy?” He says, and Sans groans. 

“so much for no blabbin’, huh, capra?” 

“She already saw it, though!” He growls, frustrated. “She’s just not saying anything about it to piss me off!” Doris gives a tiny, minute shrug, then turns to beam at you. 

“_______, sweetie, I’m so sorry I haven’t been down to visit sooner!” She says, a thousand times more cheerful now. “We’ve been swamped upstairs with all the new hires, or I would have been down sooner. I have a question, by the way. Oh, hello Sans!” She seems to have just noticed your boyfriend hanging back behind you and Capra. “This is a question for you, too.” 

“lay it on me.” Sans says with a crooked smile. 

“Blueberry or blackberry?” Doris asks, and Capra gasps. 

“Are you making them a pie and not me???” He complains, and Sans smirks.

“blueberry, right babe?” He asks, and you nod quickly. 

“Oh, god, Doris, you really don’t need to make us anything, though!” 

“Oh, it’s my pleasure. You two remind me so much of your parents, ________. It’s been so wonderful, having you back here. I’m not the only person who’s remarked on it. It’s like… it’s like having a family back together again.” She sighs, and Sans blinks, a look of genuine pleasure crossing his face for a second. Oh, god, that’s terribly sweet of Doris to say, and even sweeter of Sans, that he’d like that so much. You take a step backwards so you can lean against him just a little. Capra notices this, and narrows his eyes at you. 

“Do I need to show you the sexual harassment video again?” He drawls, and you burst out laughing, realizing that he is genuinely uncomfortable with the indication that you and Sans are very much in love. He could handle you being all over each other at the bar the other night, but this! A sweet glance, a soft touch, it was too much for him. 

“Ignore him.” Doris urges, and you giggle, in spite of yourself. “It’s the only way to get anything done.” This triggers your sense of guilt, and you look at the book on your desk. 

“Oh. Right. Getting things done. Well, I don’t know about you boys, but I’d better get back to work.” You say, and Capra nods quickly. 

“Right! Sans! We’re going to my office and you’re telling me stuff, right?” He urges, his smile even wider as he processes that this is really happening, that he’s learning something *new* and possibly forbidden. Sans winces. 

“this mighta been a huge mistake after all.” He mutters, and then holds the door open so Capra and Doris can exit. “see you in a few hours, babe. i’ll have my phone, if ya get bored.” He winks at you, and you give him a quick peck, one that catches him by surprise, because your lips strike bone and teeth. Whenever this happens, he generally makes it a point to kiss you again to make up for it, showing you just what he can do until your knees grow weak. He’s about to lean in again when Capra clears his throat, impatient. He sighs, then says “later, love,” in a very soft and deliberate way (which ends up making your knees weak even without a proper kiss). 

For the next hour, you tell yourself you’re struggling to concentrate just because you’re thinking over the afternoon; about Spot, about Capra and his enthusiasm and his ridiculous mirrored soul, and, well, not least of all about what Sans might have in store for you. 

That’s very, very distracting. 

But eventually you have to give in and realize that, after a certain point, you’re no longer being distracted by outside stimuli, you’re just struggling terribly to decipher the book in front of you. This language, whatever it is, is so esoteric that even once you force the words into English, you still need to try to figure out what that English sentence might mean. 

By five, you’ve read three and a half pages of this book, and already, you’re despairing that your endeavor was even worth it. It’s an introduction to the book, maybe. Even that’s unclear. There’s only one phrase that seems to be discussing human mages at all, but that’s come up four or five times already; “Mayges, withe their habit moste vile” (Thanks brain, for translating this language into some half-assed Middle English!).

It’s frustrating. It’s so frustrating that you’ve put in a whole day of work to discover, well, basically what you already knew, that human mages had done bad things. Or, well, habits most vile. “Goddamn it.” You finally whisper to yourself, closing the book, and then sliding it into your bag, a purposeful expression on your face. You knew the answer, and it wasn’t in these books, that was almost for certain. 

Picking up your phone, you begin to type. 

_________ (5:19 PM): Hey, babe. I’ll meet you at home, okay, I’m just gonna make a stop first.

sans (5:20 PM): hm? 

_________ (5:20 PM): I’m going to stop at the palace first, show Asgore this book, see if he can help me out. 

sans (5:21 PM): hang on.

A split second later, he’s in your office. Before he does anything else, he moves purposefully around the desk, gathers you in his arms, and then kisses you so thoroughly that for a second, once he’s pulled away, all you can do is breathe hard, considering for a second that you could surely just postpone this whole Asgore thing and instead just continue being kissed. He smiles fondly at you, then murmurs, in that lovely, deep voice that you could feel in all your bones, 

“mind if i come too? i just… don’t, uh, like… leavin’ you in the palace.” He sounds almost embarrassed to say this, and you wonder, again, just what horrors he’d seen, what he’d half-remembered. 

“Of course you can come.” You say, but for a second, neither of you budge, you just stay in his arms, leaning up against him, letting the frustration of the day flow out of you as he nuzzles your neck. “It’ll be fine. It’s just Asgore.” 

“yup. ol’ fluffybuns. it’ll be fine.” Sans tells you, or perhaps himself, and slowly releases you. “dunno why i feel nervous about this.” 

“Sans.” You sigh, slipping your hand into his. 

“hm?”

“ _Fluffybuns_?” You whisper, and with a bark of laughter, Sans traces the door to the palace.


	77. In Which You Listen To The White Album

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heh.  
> I guess my links didn't work last chapter so let me try again:
> 
> [Bask in my glory](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
> (it's just a tumblr link I don't know I don't make the rules)
> 
> ALSO YOU CAN NOW VIEW MY HALF OF THE WTMYH/COBC APRIL FOOLS CROSSOVER EVENT [HERE!!!!!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6436090)

You step through to the same grand hall of the palace you’d visited once, to go Christmas shopping. Then, it had been busy, bustling with a Christmas market that left the place choked with vendors of all sorts. Now, though, the stands had all been packed up, the visitors gone, and the hall was huge, dark, and empty. Torches attached to pillars lit the room in pools, but it was too large to be lit entirely, and immediately you felt on guard. It was silly, though. If there was a place on earth that was safe for you, it was in here, after all. 

Sans is glancing around, a particularly tense look on his face behind that big, fake smile. 

“What’s wrong?” You demand, and he shakes his head, his eyes fixed on the stained glass windows. The sun had set, of course, and the view was no longer dominated by shafts of erratic sunlight. There was the sleepy looking monster village on the bottom of the massive cavern, lit up by electricity and fire and magic, but other than that, it was dark.

“i don’t like this room.” He mutters. “don’t like not seeing the stars either.” You hesitate, then nod your head, taking a step forward.

“Come on, Sans. Let’s head in and get this over with.” He makes a soft sound that’s probably agreement, and the two of you head deeper into the palace, your footsteps echoing in the cavernous space. “He’ll still be here?” You murmur, glancing around. The place feels deserted, but at the same time, you can practically feel eyes on you, like someone’s staring.

Oh, you don’t like this place. 

“yeah. he works late. he’ll be in the throne room.” Sans mutters, leading the way. You fall back a little behind him. 

“He could have put a little more into the, um, torch budget.” You mutter, as you enter a dark hallway. Sans snorts in agreement. “Unless he really wanted to go for the whole haunted castle thing, in which case, go Asgore.”

“don’t know any self-respecting ghosts that would hang out here.” Sans says dryly, halting as you reach a large set of double doors. He knocks - somehow, Sans can make even a tap on the door sound lazy and insolent when he wants to. There’s a soft noise, a rustle of papers, and then Asgore clears his throat and says, 

“Come in?” You push the door open, glancing around. This room, at least, is well-lit, a flickering chandelier hanging from the ceiling of the strange throne room. Asgore’s brought the outside world indoors, by magic or clever gardening or both. The ground gives way to a thick cushion of grass and yellow flowers, the walls hidden by trellises bearing an abundance of flowers and fruits. There’s the soft sound of moving water - a stream, maybe, hidden somewhere in this grand room? Louder still, though, is the portable human record player set up by Asgore’s throne. You recognize the album immediately - it had been one of your parents’ favorites, after all.

“Oh! Sans, ________! I didn’t expect you here!” He says looking tired and surprised, and just a little pleased. He’s slumped down in his throne; a small desk has been set up in front of him, and there’s a massive pile of papers stacked on it, but he’s focused instead on a small book on his lap.

“Hi, Asgore. Beatles? Abbey Road?” You can’t help but ask. He lets out a low chuckle. 

“I remember the day this record fell to the underground. I wish I could go back and listen to it for the first time all over again.” Asgore rumbles, smiling to himself. “One of my biggest regrets is that the barrier fell too late, that I would never see them play live… what?” He’s caught the look on your face, and gives you an inquisitive smile. You give up and grin. 

“Nothing. You are just… such a dad.” You laugh. He grins at that, but it doesn’t entirely reach his eyes. 

“I suppose I am.” He admits, then plops the book down on top of the pile of papers, reaching for his tea. “How can I help you two? Unless you just came by to chat?” He sounds hopeful. You wince, and shake your head. 

“I was wondering…” You begin. “I found a really old book in my parents’ stuff. I can kind of make sense of it, but I was hoping maybe you could help?” Sans takes a step to stand silently next to you as Asgore’s expression brightens.

“Oh! Is that all… well, certainly! It would be my pleasure to help.” He seems so enthusiastic about this that you suddenly feel relieved. You’d been tense since you’d stepped into the palace; you didn’t know if it was the creepy atmosphere, the way Toriel had reacted to your magic the other day, or if it was just the fact that Asgore seemed so much more imposing in his throne, but you’d been definitely feeling the tension. Quickly, you open the bag, and pass the book over. His brow knits as he opens the first page, and looks it over. 

“Hm. This is a copy.” He mutters, “But it’s still handwritten. Must be two, three hundred years old, but the language is older than that… this is an old monster dialect. Ancient.” He says, running his finger slowly over the page. “Pre-war, I think…” He looks up at Sans. “Your father used to be conversant in this. He studied it in the university, since so many of the old spellbooks…” He trails off again, reading further down the page, then looks up, a curious look in his eye. “You just found this in your parents’ things?” He asks. There’s an edge to his voice. 

“Uh. Not exactly. I mean, it was in their office, at EbbCo.” You say quietly. Sans shifts uncomfortably at your side. “I guess, you know, since I found out that I could do all this stuff, I’ve been trying to learn more about human magic.” 

“Ah.” Asgore’s tone is thick with disapproval. 

“hey. she didn’t ask for any of this. and she deserves to know.” Sans says quickly. Asgore regards him silently. 

“Why don’t you ask me what you came here to ask me.” He finally says, his voice flat and chilly. He knows what you want, but he’s going to make you say it. You wince again. 

“That book. It keeps saying, I _think_ that humans did something horrible to get their magic. Toriel said something like that too.” You say, feeling Sans’ shoulder press gently against yours as you speak, lending you courage. “I need to know, Asgore.” You whisper. Sun King is playing quietly on the record player, incongruous to the suddenly grim tone of the conversation. “I need to know what I am, and what we did.” Asgore looks at you, then closes the book, passing it back. 

“No. You don’t.” He says, soft and tense. “_________. Stop digging on this.” He looks sternly at you, then at Sans. “You two are young. Babes. You don’t understand.” 

“then help us understand.” Sans says quietly, just as tense. 

“You won’t find what you’re looking for in any history book.” Asgore says, standing up. He paces irritably over to a trellis, and examines the flowers there, a massive, hulking shape looming over a planter of violets. “I had them all destroyed, all the copies in the underground, and humans… well, the mages were secretive back then, and it seems they faded into the annals of history once the barrier was erected. Rightly so.” He rubs his forehead once, then looks at you. “They weren’t all evil. Some were just arrogant. They believed the barrier was for the good of both species.”

“...What did they do, Asgore?” You try again, and he turns his massive body slowly, facing you head on. 

“They did terrible things.” He says. “They did things that I will not speak of. Things that belong in the past. Humans have evolved, I hope. You are no longer the same barbarous beasts, slinging spears and stones at your enemies.” 

“yeah, now they have guns.” Sans mutters under his breath, then claps his hand to his mouth.

“Sans!” You hiss.

“sorry!” God, couldn’t your bonehead learn to hold his tongue just once? Asgore nods judiciously at Sans, however. 

“Exactly. Your species still shows every indication of being capable of great cruelty, _______. As much as I hope and wish and pray that humans would not make the same choices as your ancestors, I see no guarantee that this is the case.” He regards you sternly. “I have extended my protection to you. I have opened the underground to you. In light of your… situation, it has always seemed appropriate to treat you as if I owed the same responsibilities to you that I owe to my subjects.” He says, then shakes his head. “I would ask that you would show me the same regard. As your monarch, I ask only one thing of you.” He makes sure you’re meeting his eyes, before he speaks again. “Drop it.” His voice echoes. 

“and if she doesn’t?” Sans says quickly. “she’s not doin’ anything bad, asgore. you know that. wouldn’t you want to know, if you were her? she’s always been a friend to us, and she isn’t even allowed to know what she is? we know she’s from a bloodline-”

“IF.” Asgore interjects. “If the two of you insist on uncovering that which should stay buried, if the horror begins anew, I will hold you both personally responsible for the damage any new human mages do.” He says, almost sorrowfully. “Their crimes will be your crimes. Their abominations will be yours. You will bear the responsibility for starting this wretched cycle anew. Do I make myself clear?” He takes a step forward, and you shrink slightly. Frisk had been willing to face this man alone.

This man had slaughtered six children, for the wellbeing of his people. 

“Understood.” You say quietly. He stares at you for another long moment, judging you silently. 

“I know you mean only the best, ________.” He finally whispers. “The road down here is paved with good intentions, though.” Sans shakes his head slowly, a look of disgust on his face as he takes in his king, but he doesn’t protest. 

“What about Frisk?” You ask suddenly. “What will you tell them, when they start asking about why they can do things other humans can’t?”

“Innate human magic is weak.” Asgore says softly. “I would remind you how you came by yours.”

“hey, pal-” Sans is unhappy about this, but Asgore doesn’t pay him the slightest heed. 

“ _If_ that day ever arrives, I will consider the matter judiciously.” Asgore announces. “Is that all?”

“...Yeah.” You sigh. “Yeah, I suppose so.” Asgore nods at the door, a clear dismissal. Before you can step outside, though, he clears his throat and speaks again. 

“This is for the good of both of our species, ________. Please. Be wise. Be cautious. Act with restraint. Lives hang in the balance. Our future hangs there as well.” You swallow, feeling fully chastised, and nod. 

“you ok-” Sans begins, once the heavy doors fall shut behind you, and you nod quickly. 

“Fine. I’m fine.” You mutter, staring down the dark hall. You can’t ignore the sound of John Lennon and Paul McCartney echoing down the hall, the words growing strange and distorted as they filter into the enormous, empty room just beyond. 

_You’re gonna carry that weight. Carry that weight a long time._

As you walk down the hall, Sans speaks up again. 

“what are you gonna tell capra?” You look at Sans, and grit your teeth. 

“I will consider the matter judiciously.” You quote Asgore, and he gives you a tense smile. 

“capra doesn’t need to know everything, anyway. ‘sides. asgore said that the answer isn’t in any book, right? so… you just keep lookin’ into those books. you’re not disobeying, are you? you’re just… interested in history.” He mutters. You laugh quietly, but his support in this makes you feel more confident. 

“What if I do uncover whatever secret it is, though? What if it’s something I can’t come back from knowing?” You mutter, and Sans smiles at you, stepping into that creepy, enormous chamber and immediately tracing a door back home. 

“whatever it is, you won’t do anything wrong with it. just don’t, you know, tell capra.” He says confidently. “c’mon. this place gives me the creeps. let’s go home and you can watch me eat pizza.”

“You’ll really eat pizza?!” Your excitement is genuine, and it takes you a second to realize how ridiculous it is. He grins at you. 

“dork.” He murmurs lovingly, and takes your hand, tugging you through onto the front step of your house. Just before the door snaps shut behind you, you hear it again, so distorted it almost sounds like… like laughter. 

_”You’re gonna carry that weight. Carry that weight a long-”_


	78. In Which Undyne And Alphys Break Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HI NERDS  
> I HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE APRIL FOOLERY!  
> YOU CAN FIND MY CHAPTER AT [THIS LINK](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6436090)
> 
> YOU CAN FIND ONA'S CHAPTER AT [THIS ONE](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6435196)
> 
> OKAY BYE

Stepping indoors, you’re almost immediately greeted by Papyrus, who doesn’t seem to note the slightly spooked expressions on your face or Sans’. 

“HUMAN! I HAVE MADE MANY MORE SNOW SKELETONS IF YOU WANT TO TRAIN WITH ME OR UNDYNE! WE’LL GET YOU INTO FIGHTING CONDITION IN NO TIME, I JUST KNOW IT!” He’s bouncing with enthusiasm, and you can feel Sans’ gaze move from his brother to you. 

“Oh… that’s so sweet of you, Paps.” You say, after a moment. “I was thinking maybe we could spend the rest of the night not thinking about violence or murder or anything, though.” Papyrus’ grin falls slightly, but after he looks at you for a second, he surprises you with one of those moments of insight. 

“OF COURSE! I JUST WANT YOU TO BE SAFE AND HAPPY, ________! YOU CAN’T BE HAPPY IF YOU HAVE TO KEEP DOING UPSETTING THINGS!” He says, gathering you up into an enormous, warm hug. You blink for a second, surprised, then hug him back. You’d been so ready to explain yourself further, to try to negate the disappointment you’d just caused, but Paps loves you without needing any of that, and he’s clearly telling the truth. He just wants you to be okay. 

“Thanks, Papyrus. You’re the best.” You sigh, then smile at him as he releases you, quietly “nyeh”ing from your compliment. “You okay with just hanging out and eating pizza tonight?” Papyrus nods, a sly look crossing his face. 

“DID YOU KNOW THAT THERE’S A PLACE THAT PUTS MACARONI AND CHEESE ON TOP OF PIZZA? DO YOU THINK…?” He sounds almost too hopeful. You beam at him. 

“I’ll see if I can make it happen, Paps.” You promise, and, feeling considerably cheered, fish out your phone to call the local pizza place. Sans smiles fondly at you as you dial, then nods for Papyrus to walk out of the foyer with him (it’s hard to make phone calls with Papyrus in the background sometimes, which Sans knows), asking about his day. Papyrus chatters eagerly about the new flowers Asgore had allowed him to plant, and you smile after their retreating backs until a person at the pizza place picks up. God, you love your guys.

\-----------------------------------

Undyne comes sailing in from the garage about twenty minutes later, finding you, Sans, Papyrus, Ghost and L.D. in the family room (at some point, the TV room had changed names, maybe around the same time you’d accepted that you’d acquired a family), watching the news with half-hearted interest. You’ve changed into comfy clothes, and you’re enjoying the relative peace more than even the “pet of the week” segment the weather guy is doing. Undyne observes this, looking tired, but quite pleased. 

“Hey gang. Family meeting tonight!” She calls out. 

“oh yeah? ‘bout what?” Sans says, smiling at her enthusiasm.

“Everything okay?” You ask at the same time, seeing the weariness in her eye - you’re worried about her working all alone at the aquarium. 

“Hm? Yeah, fine. It’s big important wedding stuff!” She says, beaming. “Alphys got us a venue - they’re gonna let us use the green at the University, but it’s only a few months away, so we need to do planning!”

“Oh, Undyne, that’s awesome!” You say, grinning up at her, relieved that it isn’t a disaster.

“Yeah! It’s gonna rule! But we’ve got so much to decide on. Okay, shower, hang on, they had me on seals today, stepped in so much poop.” And just like that she’s gone again, sprinting upstairs. 

“...I HOPE SHE’S WEARING DIFFERENT SHOES NOW.” Papyrus says in the brief silence following her departure. You blink, then begin howling with laughter, shaking your head. Oh, god, it feels good to be home with the people you love. Just then the doorbell rings, and Papyrus jumps to his feet. “I’LL GET THE PIZZA!” You watch him tear off, then think of the reaction of the poor delivery person to the seven foot tall, hyper skeleton, and stand up to join him, still laughing. Sans grins at you, and settles back drowsily into the couch, his eyesockets half closed, looking quite content. Oh, you want him to have more of this, the easy nights, the moments of peace where he gets to enjoy being with Papyrus. 

You’ll have more, you resolve. You’ll get into less trouble. You’ll stay out of the news, stay off Asgore’s shit list, just… let him have this. Let yourself have this. By the time that you’re at Papyrus’ side, passing the chalk white delivery guy a few bills while Paps relieves him of the stack of pizzas, you’re dedicated to the idea. You’ll be chill. Less magic. Less chaos. More time with your family.

You look over the array of snowmen - targets - that Papyrus has constructed in the front yard, and sigh, watching the pizza guy drive off. It’s nice, for the moment, to pretend that you have control over any of that. It’s nice to pretend that you have it within your power to give Sans, to give everyone, all that they deserve. 

\-----------------------------------

Alphys has joined you in the family room by the time the pizza is distributed, and she and Undyne sit next to each other on the loveseat, both looking happier than you can remember them being in a while. Alphys has her stumpy tail wrapped around Undyne’s back, which you can’t help but think is terribly cute. They don’t show affection quite as much as you and Sans (well, who does, you think ruefully, feeling the weight of his bony arm around your shoulders) but when they do, it always seems so sweet. You’re so pleased that your friends are so happy together. 

“So! Come on, family meeting, tell me the details!” You demand, grinning and talking around a mouthful of pizza. Undyne smirks at your behavior. 

“Hey. Hey _______. Remember when you used to be worried about being cute for Sans? Remember that time you and I spent the entire day trying to figure out what you’d wear on your first date?” She asks, grinning evilly. “And now…” She gestures lazily at all of you, somehow managing to encompass your sweatpants, your awful novelty t-shirt, and the way you’d just spoken with your mouth full. Sans snickers next to you as you shrug unapologetically, and he pulls you down a little with the arm around your shoulders, so he can kiss your cheek. 

“i’m a great influence.” He says with a proud grin, and you swallow and beam at him, snuggling a little closer while balancing your paper plate on your lap. Alphys lets out a giggle, while Undyne rolls her eye for neither of you rising to her bait. 

“You’re both gross.” She grumbles, but then looks at Alphys and smiles again, her expression growing much softer. “SO! We have a date!”

“Y-yeah!” Alphys says eagerly. “April s-sixteenth! All the s-students will be on break, so I got permission to use the green and the really fancy founders’ room for the party and we’re gonna rent tents and use the university’s caterers and it’ll be g-great!” She’s practically bursting with enthusiasm. 

“Oh, Alphys… guys, that’s wonderful.” You sigh, picturing the university, perched on one of the small foothills adjacent to Mt. Ebott, it had a view of the mountain and the ocean from the sprawling green at the center of campus. “That’ll be so beautiful!”

“‘s great.” Sans agrees, much more genuine. “soon though! you guys gonna be ready?”

“We’ll have to rush some things.” Undyne admits, still beaming. “But, you know, why wait? We’ve got this chance right now, we should take it!” 

“...yeah.” Sans says, thinking this over, his arm tightening just a little around your shoulders, and something in your chest twists unexpectedly, not entirely unpleasantly, and you suddenly find you have to keep looking straight ahead, at Alphys and Undyne, because god, you can’t look at this man that you love right now. 

“So, we need to talk logistics!” Undyne is now in full Captain of the Guard Mode. “_________, you’re second in command.”

“S-she means you’re the maid of honor.” Alphys explains quietly, and you giggle, grinning at Undyne. “Um, s-sorry I ruined that.”

“You didn’t ruin anything!” You insist, still beaming. “I’m so excited.”

“Awesome, punk!” Undyne’s blushing a little, but she’s grinning at you. “Papyrus, I’m gonna need you in the wedding party too, pal.” 

“WHAT? REALLY?” Papyrus, on your other side, sits straight up, abandoning his piece of ziti pizza (hey, you’d come close to mac and cheese!) for the time being. “I’VE NEVER EVEN SEEN A WEDDING BEFORE!” He says excitedly, and you smile at him - the skeleton you can currently make eye contact with, enjoying his enthusiasm. 

“Well, yeah, Paps, I need you up there with me. You and _______ and Frisk are my best friends. No offense, Sans.” Undyne says quickly. “Just… oh, damn it!” She glances at Alphys, who giggles at Undyne.

“Heh, n-now we’re even. I w-was just hoping you’d stand on my side, Sans.” She says quietly. “Y-you know, I didn’t have a lot of friends underground, but, um, you were always there for me. No matter what. It would mean a lot.” You peak at Sans from the corner of your eyes, and manage to catch the flustered, delighted look that flashes across his face for a split second before he’s all lazy grins. 

“sure, alph. be an honor.” He says slowly, like he gets asked to do this every day, but you can hear the clear satisfaction in his voice. 

“BUT WHAT ARE WE SUPPOSED TO DO?” Papyrus demands, and you clear your throat.

“Actually, um, I wouldn’t mind a rundown of a monster wedding, either.” You admit, grinning.

“Oh, right!” Undyne says. “I mean, I’ve seen lots of human weddings on TV. It’s basically the same thing. We’ll stand up there, trade a meaningful gift marking the union - usually rings, but not everyone has fingers so it can be like bracelets or tattoos or whatever - and the queen will ask us to make our promises to each other, you know, that we’re going to be with each other forever and ever, until we fall down and turn to dust, that we’ll be each other’s beginnings and endings and blah blah blah…” She recites like she’s heard this a thousand times, and you gather quickly that there’s a ritualized set of words that must be familiar to the monsters. Alphys elbows her. 

“It’s really b-beautiful.” She insists, then wrinkles her nose. “I h-have a question, though. Um, humans promise the same thing, right? When they get married?” Suddenly, all eyes in the room are on you. 

“Oh, uh, yeah, more or less. I don’t think we do the turn to dust part.” You say, shrugging. 

“BECAUSE HUMANS DON’T TURN TO DUST!” 

“Um, yeah, Paps. Do monsters really… um, you know what, this is morbid. Anyway, yeah, Alphys, same basic idea.” You supply. 

“Oh.” She continues to look at you, and then Undyne, shyly, speaks up;

“Because we’ve met some humans that say they used to be married? And now they’re not, but their spouse is still alive and stuff...” 

“Oh!” You blink. “You mean, they got divorced? Yeah, um, that happens.”

“they go back on their word?” Sans sounds personally offended. 

“Well, you know, sometimes things don’t always work out as well as people think they will. Sometimes you don’t really know the person you’re getting married to.” You say, grimacing. 

“Ohhhh.” Undyne looks relieved, figuring this out. “Because you guys can’t share souls! Yeah, I guess that makes sense! God, can you imagine if we were going into this and we couldn’t even see each other’s...” She says, looking seriously at Alphys, who shakes her head slowly.

“well, _______ can. _______ is like us.” Sans says firmly, sounding awfully relieved. “ _she_ wouldn’t make a promise and then change her mind.” You dart a glance at him again; he’s looking at you rather fiercely, and the twisting in your chest amplifies exponentially. 

“Um. No. I wouldn’t.” You tell him quietly, and a relieved smile creeps onto his face. Oh god. You’ve never felt this particular brand of anxiety before. You’re not even sure it _is_ anxiety. It might just be…

Anticipation?

“Poor humans. You must have felt like you could never really know anyone, before you could see souls.” Undyne muses. “No wonder you guys fight so much.” You shake your head. 

“No. I mean, we hope. We hope for the best in people. At least I do.” You say quietly. “Sometimes, we’re even right.” 

“SHE COULDN’T SEE OUR SOULS BEFORE SHE MET US!” Papyrus chimes in, and L.D. whuffs quietly from his spot on the floor. 

“yeah.” Sans says warmly. “takes a lot of guts to trust us all anyway…”

“It was easy. I could tell without seeing your souls, the kinds of people you were.” You demur, trying to ignore the way his pointer finger is tracing a small design on your shoulder. “Anyway. Forget the human stuff, I need to know what I can do! Do you guys want a bachelorette party? Or, um, bachelorette parties?” Undyne’s eyes light up. 

“What’s that?!”

You do your best to explain it to them, and end up apologizing after a while that so many of the bachelorette party goods came in tacky penis shapes. Alphys makes a face, Sans snickers, Papyrus looks confused, and Undyne is absolutely delighted. 

“Um… I d-don’t need a bachelorette party.” Alphys decides quickly. 

“Well I DO!” Undyne bellows. “WITH PENIS SHAPED EVERYTHING!”

“oh god.” Sans can’t stop laughing. Alphys gives Undyne a look. 

“Really?” She squeaks.

“Yes!!!” Undyne crows. “As much as you can find, this is going to be hilarious!”

“You might regret that. They seriously make everything. There’s like, penis candy, penis party games, penis pasta-”

“PENIS PASTA?” Papyrus sounds appalled, which causes the entire discussion to run spectacularly off the rails. You’re sobbing by the time you’ve gathered your composure, and Undyne is clutching her abs, trying not to laugh any more. 

“terrible influence.” Sans murmurs in your ear, like he hadn’t been laughing as hard as anyone, and you groan and stand up. 

“Okay. Okay. Oh god.” You wipe your eyes, and begin gathering up the leftover pizza to put in the fridge. “Just keep me posted, guys. If you need help picking out formal clothes or you need any help with surface stuff, I’m your girl.” 

“Thanks, pal!” Undyne wheezes, and Alphys gives you a more genuine smile. 

“lemme give you a hand.” Sans says, pushing himself to his feet, and takes half the pizza boxes, following you down the hall into the kitchen. Where you’re on your own with him. Oh god. 

“Hey, sorry, I didn’t mean to traumatize your brother.” You say, a little guiltily, pulling out the aluminum foil. Sans shrugs, still grinning. 

“heh, he’ll be fine. he’s old enough, he could be dating or whatever, i mean… just, you know, he’s paps. doesn’t seem like that’s one of his interests.” He says, laughing a little. 

“Unlike his brother.” You have to point out. Sans snorts with laughter, and shrugs again.

“guilty. hey, uh, ______?” Uh oh. That laughing tone has suddenly grown much more serious.

“Yeah?” You strive to make your own seem light and relaxed. Sans hesitates. 

“we’re… i mean, us, you and me, we’re…” He looks down at the pizza he’s supposed to be storing for the fridge, then shakes his head. “eh, i dunno what i’m asking. forget it.” He says, suddenly embarrassed, his cheeks a soft blue. 

“Sans?” Nerves or not, you can’t stand to see him looking like that. He looks back up at you, and he shrugs after a moment. 

“i’m bein’ impatient, that’s all.” He says quietly, taking a step closer. “no rush, right? you’re not goin’ anywhere?” He says softly, and you nod quickly. 

“I’m not. Promise.” You say, and he gives you a crooked smile and turns back to his task. 

“ok.” He seems satisfied with that, for now at least. Which is good. Fine. Really. It’s all you want, really. Right? Right. 

Right. 

\------------------------------------------

It would be hard to watch this movie even without Undyne giving him sympathetic glances every few minutes. Not that it was a bad movie - he didn’t get a lot of the references in Bridesmaids, but it was fine, he supposed. Probably for the best that Papyrus had wanted to go to bed before you started watching it, but it was fine. He would have been distracted all the same, even without Undyne, because you were curled up in that way he loved, your legs across his lap, your head nestled on his shoulder, your warm breath on his neck. That was enough to get his mind wandering, but then _Undyne_ , she had to keep giving him those damn sympathetic looks, and he had to keep wondering just how obvious he was, how clearly she could read his jealousy of her, of Alphys, of both of them for being so… united. 

When Undyne had asked him if she should propose to Alphys, the only time she’d ever had a serious talk with him, really, he’d been floored for a moment. Then, of course, he’d immediately and enthusiastically encouraged her, because he knew how Alphys felt about her, and he wanted both of his friends to be happy together. He had to gather that these sympathetic looks, coupled with Undyne’s lack of sudden peptalk, told him everything he needed to know about if he should ask you to commit to him the same way. And, fuck, there were a thousand reasons why he just needed to wait. It wasn’t like this time together was wasted, after all. It wasn’t like getting a slightly more specific promise from you was going to change anything. It was just…

He looks at you again, from the corners of his eyes, and he is overwhelmed with how much he longed to be able to know for sure that this one, this perfect thing would never be snatched away. He’d lost so much, and he loved you so much and it was all just… so much. But he’d seen the look on your face, even when he toyed with dancing around the subject, and he fears that was the expression of a temporarily frozen creature, the way that animals on the surface would get startled, hold stock still for a split second, then go running off to safety. He can't lose you because he insists on pushing for more, longing for something he can't possibly have earned yet. 

You make a sleepy noise and absently kiss the shoulder you’re resting your head on, and something huge and hungry stirs inside of him again, a want so big it almost feels like heartbreak. You’d said it, you’d said you’d never make a promise like that and just change your mind. And you’d said you weren’t going anywhere. You’d promised, and he didn’t need to be scared, he didn’t need to worry that so much of the world seemed to be aimed against you now, that even Asgore seemed like he’d be willing to tear you away from him, if necessary. You’d promised. It would be okay. He’d be fine, you’d be fine. It would all be fine. 

Fine.


	79. In Which Everyone Is Well Behaved In Front Of Everyone While Watching Bridesmaids

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sexual content warning for like basically this entire stupid chapter so   
> if you need to skip it  
> there's a little paragraph at the end there you need  
> yikes, tst

Maybe Bridesmaids hadn’t been that great of a choice of movie, all things considered. You’d just wanted Alphys and Undyne to see it, one, because it was hilarious, and two, because you could show them the things that were generally expected on a surface wedding this way. Well, hopefully not the violent poops in a dressing room, but the rest of it was surely good information! But, god, Sans…

You were trying not to think about it, honestly, the way he’d stumbled over his words in the kitchen and then quickly changed topics. You weren’t stupid, you knew what he’d been about to say. He wanted you to be his, to make that promise that monsters couldn’t, didn’t break. He wanted you to marry him. God, even thinking about it, just letting it in your head… it was just _so_ soon! You’d been dating for two months, barely! You’d never, ever, _ever_ thought that you’d be the kind of person who was even considering flirting with the idea of what that would be like. 

But… you sigh quietly, contentedly, as he shifts his arm around you just a little. Your back is up against the armrest of the sofa, your legs across his lap, and he’s got his arm tight around you like always, bony fingers trailing up and down your ribcage in a way that tells you that, regardless of where those white lights in his eye sockets are focused, most of his attention is still on you. His other hand is woven through yours, bone against bone in a familiar, comforting gesture. Oh… Sans. It wasn’t fair that he could make you melt so easily, that his small, sweet signs of affection could have your brain whirling with thoughts that were clearly not fully fleshed out. Was it really so bad that it had only been two months? 

After all, you _knew_. You knew him down to his core (and you’d been itching, recently, to explore his soul again, to demonstrate to him how much you appreciated how good he’d been to you during all the chaos and upheaval of the last few weeks). The standard rules of getting to know each other were out the window, now that you had touched each other’s souls. You knew him, and you knew just how decent of a man he was. And you knew how much he loved you, more than you could ever have hoped to be loved. He loved you like a force of nature, like it was just as much a part of him as his intelligence, or his sense of humor, or his magic. And you knew why he wanted this. He had spent so long just… losing. Losing everything, everyone, over and over again. And now he was free and clear, and on the surface, and he had you, and he _had_ to sense that the wolves were closing in, that there were threats on all sides when it came to you, and you knew it, you knew that he was petrified of losing you here, now, where it would count, where it would never reset. 

But still - your rational brain suddenly screeches, catching your attention away from him. Two months, _________! Two months! Your seventh grade boyfriend had been around longer than that! It was insane that you were even entertaining the thought. He’d better wait! You didn’t want to be put in the kind of position where you had to make that huge call on the spot, after all. Two months. It was barely any amount of time. It was - 

His wandering hand moves a few inches from your ribs to trace lazily over the side of your breast, and you take in a quick breath, glancing immediately at Alphys and Undyne on the loveseat. They’re totally wrapped up in the end of the movie, however, howling with laughter and entirely unaware that your boyfriend is being awfully bold. You slowly turn your head back to look at Sans - he’s grinning at the TV, not looking at you at all, but you know that light in his eyes, suddenly all mischief, and maybe something else… You’re about to make a face at him when he does it again, slower and somehow more deliberately, and it’s all you can do not to squeak or react in a way that will get Alphys or Undyne’s attention - you’ll never hear the end of it! Hmm… oh, your bonehead was being _needy_ tonight.

Looking at him in your peripheral vision, thinking of the way he’d stood there next to you in Asgore’s throne room, ready to defend you and lend you strength, even when it put him at odds with his king… well, you decide suddenly that you don’t mind needy so much right now. He knows you’re struggling to not react, and his smile is particularly self-satisfied at the moment, but when he tries the same move one more time, fingers tracing very pointedly over the novelty t-shirt (which reads “Gettin’ Lucky in Kentucky!” in a truly obnoxious font), his digits crackling faintly with that sensation of magic, you surprise him by leaning just a little against his touch, pressing your breast into his hand. He blinks - you watch him from the corner of your eye and are able to note his profoundly pleased smirk once he realizes you’re playing along. Good. He needs some reassurance that, no matter how unwilling you are to talk marriage right now, that doesn’t mean that you don’t need or want him. 

Leaning forward, you kiss his shoulder, then, when you’re certain that Undyne and Alphys still aren’t paying you the slightest amount of attention, move closer still, finding his neck, your tongue moving delicately over warm, polished bone. He is so beautifully constructed, you think wistfully, allowing yourself to slip into the sort of lovestruck admiration you’d been trying to avoid in order to favor the sensible decision making that you needed, with all this talk of marriage in the air. Right now, you don’t have it in you to be removed from the moment, and you allow yourself to be enamored by the invisible strength that holds his body together, by the heat and shape and beautifully smooth texture of his bones themselves. He makes a barely audible grunt as your tongue traces the edge of a vertebrae, then he shivers slightly, finding your nipple through your shirt and rubbing his finger (too) gently against it for a moment. Oh... thank god it’s dark! You pull your head back, a protest dying on your lips, which is just as well since you’re not sure if you were about to scold him for being so bold in front of your friends, or if you were about to urge him to stop holding back. You remember yourself and sit back against the arm of the sofa, smiling softly at him and shaking your head. He pouts, but when you nod at your friends, he sighs very quietly, and inclines his own head. 

“much is left in this movie?” He’s loud enough for Alphys and Undyne to hear, sounding merely curious. 

“Ssssh!” Undyne demands, wiping her eye and finally glancing over in your direction. “It’s almost over!”

“good.” Sans laughs, and settles for tormenting you in the meantime by unfolding his fingers from yours; you can see where this is going a mile away, and you’re braced enough that you don’t even twitch when he begins toying with the tiny bones of your wrist, a smug expression on his face. Ahh, damn it, he’s so _good_ at that! Part of it is surely that everything you feel on your (damn it again!) skarm is just stronger by a significant magnitude - Sans assures you that this will fade with time, though you don’t know how he can be so certain about that. The other part is, of course, that as a skeleton, he just knows this part of your anatomy like no other lover could, and he understands those fine distinctions, the intimacy of exploring the spaces between your bones that were just for him, just for the person you trusted enough to expose all your greatest vulnerabilities to. 

You have to bite your lip to make sure you don’t make a sound when his fingers slide further up your arm - god, it is just not fair that he can do that to you. He observes this silently, and continues, looking wickedly amused, his fingers dragging, painfully slowly, over the inside of your ulna and radius. The end credits of the movie are spooling at last, and Alphys and Undyne are laughing quietly with each other. Undyne glances over in your direction as she helps Alphys up to her feet, and immediately snorts. 

“Hey, now I definitely get why you were pissed when Capra touched her arm.” She says, eyebrows waggling. You can’t imagine what expression must be on your face for her to say that, you think, feeling warm and embarrassed. Sans tenses slightly at the reminder, and he rather audaciously keeps tracing his path down your arm while you flush, not trusting your voice to say something sarcastic back to Undyne, not while he was doing that anyway. He notices your reticence, and if anything, his grin grows wider. Infuriating, bony…. jerk! “You having a good time, pal?” Undyne teases you further, and you give up, glaring at her. 

“I _was._ ” You drawl, managing to keep your voice from shaking for the two syllables. Undyne arches her brows and Alphys giggles quietly. 

“A-are you guys headed upstairs? S-should we l-lock up for the night?”

“go ahead.” Sans says lazily. “think we’re gonna watch a few more episodes of something.” Undyne tilts her head slightly, looking at Sans, and something passes between them you don’t understand at all. Then she shrugs, grins at Alphys, and murmurs, 

“C’mon, Alphy-chan.” Alphys giggles at that, and trots out of the room at Undyne’s side. You wait for their footsteps to fade to nothing before you turn to look at Sans, who’s busily picking something out on the Roku, all innocence suddenly, except for the hand still occupied with your arm.

“Couldn’t wait for our friends to… mmm.” You’ve lost your composure entirely, now that Alphys and Undyne are gone, and you can’t even make it through your entire observation before you finally let that pleased noise out. Sans grins, picking out some cartoon and setting it to autoplay, then turns to face you. “Baby, are we really still watching TV?” You ask, trying to gather your thoughts back up from the pile he had been steadily breaking them down into. “Don’t you wanna go - fuck!” You hiss, your eyes flying wide open as he does something totally new, fingers wrapping around your ulna entirely, gripping it loosely. He looks profoundly satisfied with that reaction.

“maybe i don’t wanna go all the way upstairs.” He murmurs, and you giggle, still trying to catch your breath.

“Right. So far away.” You say helplessly, then narrow your eyes at him, a thought occurring. “You wouldn’t - mmmm, Sans.” He’s still teasing you, fingertips searching out every sensitive spot he’d found on your bones so far. Distractedly, you pry him loose, which earns you yet another pout. You’ll have to do something about that. 

“want you here.” He breathes. “‘s so _hard_ seeing you blush when we eat in the kitchen.” He’s referring to the kitchen table incident, of course, and he’s right, you still had a hard time making eye contact when you ate there with your small family, since specific memories kept bubbling to the surface of the one time that it had not been used for anything close to its proper purpose. “i was thinkin’, maybe it would be good for you if the kitchen wasn’t the only place we misused. for the sake of your blushing. get you acclimated.” He’s got a devilish look on his face again, one that makes your heart stutter, and he leans forward to kiss you in a way that’s no longer playing around. You feel like you should be resist that kind of dubious logic, but he slides his hand up into your shirt while he’s kissing you, and damn does that end up being the worst kind of distraction. 

“Mhm.” You finally whisper, pulling away. He’s breathing hard, glowing tongue lolling out between sharp canines in that obscene, inhuman way that you can’t help but love. “Nothing to do with wanting to bone me in every room of the house, then.”

“nothin’.” He agrees, his smile growing wider still as he processes just how easy it is for you to see through him. He doesn’t seem to particularly care; he pulls you closer, simultaneously trying to work you out of your shirt, and you lean in to kiss him again, feeling him growing hard against your thigh with no small amount of satisfaction. He’s being such a horndog right now that it seems only fitting to provide a counterpoint, so when you kiss him, it is as soft and sincere and loving as you know how, your fingertips caressing his cheekbone, your thoughts full of nothing more than how much you love him, how much you want him to know that. He pulls away, taking in a gasping breath, and for a split second, that mischievous, careless look is gone from his face, replaced by something desperate and needful and heart-wrenching, and your hand moves instantly, without thinking, to the space just above where his soul lies.

“Sans.” You whisper, almost a demand, realizing at once that you had just seen a very convincing act crumble to pieces, that you’d seen the truth behind the mask he had been wearing for at least the last twenty minutes. He opens his mouth to speak, you think-

“SANS?!” For a second, you’re both startled by the sudden voice, but when it repeats itself, “SANS???” you place it. It’s Papyrus, somewhere upstairs, sounding anxious and lost. “SANS, I’M SORRY, IT WAS THE NIGHTMARE AGAIN, YOU SAID TO FIND YOU BUT I DON’T KNOW WHERE YOU ARE…” 

“oh. _shit._ ” Sans whispers, looking frozen for a second. “babe, I…” He’s truly cringing now, like you’re going to be mad at him for some reason, because Papyrus clearly needs him and because, well, of course he is, he’s going to leave and find out why. “i’m so sorry, uh, i can do this fast, i-”

“Hey, it’s alright!” You urge quickly, whispering back. “Go be with your brother!” You straighten your shirt, standing up, and he blinks at you, not comprehending. “He needs you, baby. Take all the time you need, please. I’ll be in our room if you need me.” You give him a hand up (he’s still moving a little robotically), and you kiss his forehead softly. “C’mon. Go be a hero.” You instruct, giving him a reassuring smile. He stares at you once again, like he can’t believe what you’re saying, but then Papyrus lets out a distressed whine, and Sans walks quickly in the direction of his brothers’ voice, calling,

“comin’, bud. where are you?”

You listen until you hear the muffled, staccato sound of Papyrus speaking quickly and quietly to Sans, and release out a held breath. Okay. What on earth had just happened there?! Sans had been acting normal - well, normal for him, sometimes…. well, okay, he’d been a bit public with all that affection, even for him. You’d just been avoiding finding anything off about it because, well, it had been nice to see him so relaxed. And, yeah, he’d been doing an excellent job of seducing you, even in public, so much so that you really hadn’t put any thought into the fact that maybe he wasn’t as calm and playful as he’d been trying to make you believe!

Shaking your head slowly, you turn off the TV, double check to make sure that everything’s locked, and give Ghost one last scoop of cat food before padding quietly upstairs. At the end of the hall, you can hear Papyrus and Sans talking softly, and do your best not to eavesdrop, though due to Papyrus’ pitch, you can’t help but overhear a little: “-TIED US UP, AND FRISK WAS RUNNING, BUT THERE WAS SO MUCH HURT-”

You take a deep breath, and walk quickly down the hall, and into your room. Poor Papyrus. Poor Sans. Poor everyone, they’d all suffered so much in the underground, and sometimes, you thought to yourself, that suffering demonstrated itself in very different ways. Oh, god, poor Sans. Replaying the last twenty minutes, then the last two hours, you understand that you’d not been paying close enough attention to what must have been running through his head, the desire to keep you safe, make sure that you stayed with him. You’d thought you had understood that, but in retrospect, you could have been more comforting, rather than panicking at the idea that he might want more of a commitment already.

Well, it wasn’t too late. He’d been trying to give you the casual, relaxed time together that he’d figured you wanted. You could do the same for him - you knew he needed reassurance, so you would give him that. A thought slowly began to take root in your brain, something big and scary and wholly necessary all at once.

\-----------------------------------------

When he steps inside your room, nearly twenty minutes later, he’s already wincing like you’re about to throw a shoe at him. You want to put that fear to rest immediately. 

“Hey, baby.” You say softly, sitting up in bed. “Is Papyrus okay?” He hesitates, then nods, padding forwards. You pat the spot next to you in the bed, and he eyes it skeptically, then, looking a little wary, climbs in. He rests his back against the headboard, looking down at white, bony knees, and takes a breath. 

“yeah. yeah. old nightmare. we worked through it.” He says quietly, then instantly adds, “________, i’m sorry, i know i just ditched you back there and-” He’s cut off, helpless, when you lean in to kiss him. He’s not prepared, but you still remain where you are, your lips pressed to teeth and bone, letting him process this until his arms slowly wind around you. 

“Sans.” You whisper, once he seems a little more comfortable with everything. “If Papyrus needs your help, you go to him. Of course I’m not mad.” He stares at you, and you run your hand over his skull, then kiss his neck again. “You don’t need to choose, baby. You never need to feel bad if you need to leave to go help Paps, no matter what we’re doing. And you don’t need to act like everything’s okay if it’s not. I know there’s a lot going on right now.” You sigh. “Sans, I love you. I love you so much. I don’t want you to feel like you need to pretend everything’s fine for me. I don’t want an act. I want to be there for you when you need me.” He stares at you, wordlessly processing what you’re telling him. 

“i wanna be there for _you,_ though.” He finally pronounces. “don’t wanna be weak. don’t want to leave you on your own to face the bad stuff.” You can’t help it, you let out a soft giggle, and he stares at you with wide eyes. 

“Oh, god, Sans. You are so far from weak. You’re the strongest, bravest person I know.” You whisper. He takes a deep breath. “And you didn’t leave me on my own to face the bad stuff. You never do. You just helped your brother out when he needed it, which was perfect. It’s what a good man does. It’s what I want _my_ man to do.” You assure him, and the light in his eyes grows stronger at that reminder, that he’s yours. He likes that very much. “I love you. Can I show you how much I love you?” You whisper. He swallows, then nods. “I need you to trust me.” You say quietly, marveling at this monster in the dim light, your fingers running slowly over his ribs, down his sternum, the fabric of his t-shirt occasionally bunching in the way. He groans softly, then mutters,

“trust you with everything, _______. trust you with my soul. and everything else, really.” He says, giving you a crooked grin after a moment. You kiss his cheek, then find his lips, present this time, kissing him for a long, sweet moment. 

“You don’t need to hide what’s going on in your head from me, baby.” You finally decide. “Even if it’s something huge and tough to talk about-”

“-i don’t wanna lose you.” He chimes in instantly, like he’s been waiting for this, and you shake your head. 

“You won’t.” You assure him. “You’re stuck with me.” He beams at that, then tries not to look too thrilled, you can tell, when your next act is to begin taking your clothes off. He generally prefers to do this himself, but in this one instance, he doesn’t seem to mind at all that his job is just to watch you strip naked. 

“hmm, think i like when i have to trust you.” He mutters, unable to help himself. You snort (probably a little unattractively) and then grin at him, trying to express your entire adoration for him in that smile. He beams back at you, and suddenly you’re on the same page again. 

“Well, it’s your turn next.” You purr, slowly easing his t-shirt off. He chuckles, and, still slightly marveling, allows himself into this receptive role. Sans has always made it clear that he enjoys being in charge during sex. In fact, the two of you have never entertained the alternative before right now. He looks a little nervous as you nudge him onto his back, your lips attached to his neck, but right now, he really is trusting you. 

By the time you ease his shorts off, he’s already there, hard and waiting, but you ignore this welcome discovery for the time being. You can’t remember if the two of you have ever really taken your time with him - the fact that you can’t remember this tells you it probably hasn’t happened - so you want to embrace the opportunity while you have it. He looks up at you, questioning for a moment, before you straddle his thighs and begin to explore his neck, his spine, his ribs, all with your mouth and tongue and hands. You’ve learned so much from what he’s showed you; you know the value in those places other people aren’t allowed to touch. You know the experience now, what he must be feeling when your tongue slides into the space between two ribs or your fingertips just lightly massage the inside of his pelvis, places nobody but him has ever touched before.

He’s in bliss. His eyes are closed, he’s panting, his breathing just a hoarse rasp interspersed with a few low, desperate, “oh god”s. You can’t help but feel a profound satisfaction in helping him reach this state - though eventually, you have to admit that you might also be a little cruel by taking so long to satisfy your curiosity; his right hand keeps twitching, and you realize after a while that he keeps on restraining himself just before he can start stroking himself.

“Mmm, sorry, baby.” You breathe, smiling again, and this time you work at him with your left hand, wanting him to think about the fact that he’s with a human, and that no matter what other humans might have done, this one adores him. He groans your name loudly, his eyes fixed on you through the darkness, and suddenly, you need more. Inching up his body, your legs splayed around him, you place him at your entrance, and hold still, waiting for his permission.

“hnnng - oh. oh shit.” He gasps, and then gives you a wide, wild smile. “i didn’t even know this was an option!” He mutters, looking at you on top of him like he’s never seen such a wonderful thing, and you remember, guiltily, that your man had been, until relatively recently, trying everything for the first time.

“Definitely an option.” You giggle, and he grins up at you, and this is so much better, neither of you hiding or playing games or thinking the worst of each other. “Can I-”

“ _please._ ” He whispers roughly, and then gasps, hoarse and wondering, as you lower yourself onto him and begin to move. Oh, he always feels so good, like he’s designed for you. Fuck, you love him. Oh, god, you love everything about him, and this moment, and… just everything. Right now, you love the entire world, everything in it, but especially him, especially the way he looked at you like you were his whole universe.

You watch him closely - you would have watched him closely anyway, but this time, right now, you needed to see where he was, know what he was feeling, because in between the waves of pleasure you were getting from him, you had an end goal in mind. A very specific, possibly stupid end goal, but one all the same. He’s unaware of anything but what he’s feeling in the moment, his eyes bright and blissful, but soon enough he’s thrusting up into you at a urgent pace - he can’t stay entirely passive forever - and you know that his peak is rapidly approaching. “Sans. Can I?” You breathe, getting his attention, your hand hovering over his chest again, right above where that beautiful soul is, and he looks up at you, uncomprehending for only a second before his eyes go wide.

“yes. fuck. yes!” He pants, looking at you in delighted disbelief, and you close your eyes almost all the way, trying to concentrate as he tries to hold back. At last, you pull it forth; it’s the most beautiful thing, the most perfect concentration of pure blue, and you just have to see if for a second before you’re closing the distance, wondering if this is somehow wrong or sacrilegious or an offense to monsters or something, because it seems like it’s _so much_ \- well, if it’s wrong, Sans doesn’t care; he looks rapturous in anticipation. Your fingers just graze the edge of his soul, and it’s like…

Fireworks, exploding through every inch of you. It’s power and it’s light and it’s energy, and it’s beauty, and it’s chaos and order and it’s him. Oh, god, it’s so perfect, and it’s him. It’s intimate in a way that nothing else has been, nothing else could ever possibly be. It’s almost too much. You’re swamped with his magic - you’re distantly aware that you’re both finishing, but that just isn’t as important, it can’t be, because you’re caressing his soul, and you know all of him, and he’s crying, or maybe you are, it’s hard to distinguish right now where one of you ends and the other begins…

It doesn’t last that long, in retrospect. Maybe not even a minute of perfect harmony, of profound understanding, before you’re both too weary to continue; it’s _exhausting._ You don’t discuss it, how it happens, but it seems that you both agree it’s over, that you can’t take another second of perfection, because then all of a sudden you’re lying at his side, and his soul is safe, tucked back away, his hand is in your hair, and he’s just fixed on you in the gentlest, most tender way. 

The thought pushes through your head, stubborn and nearly embarrassing, almost hilarious: How long do you need to wait before you can marry this man? 

You look him over, sigh, and whisper, “I love you so much, Sans.” He lets out something that’s almost a laugh and murmurs, 

“love you too,” leaning forward to kiss a fresh, tender bitemark on your neck - when had that happened? you honestly couldn’t remember! You laugh hoarsely (god, you hope you hadn’t been screaming), and you wrap your arms tight around him. He does the same, his hand still moving slowly through your hair. 

\--------------------------------------------

You don’t remember falling asleep, but you’re certainly aware of waking up. You squint at the clock, hearing Sans’ voice in the darkness, and a wave of fear rises in your chest - phone calls this time of night are never good. 

“yes. we’ll be there. _______ can take frisk somewhere safe.” He’s saying, calm and measured. You gather, without being told, that something huge is going down, and you grit your teeth, immediately going to the armoire and finding comfortable, dark clothes for you and Sans. ”just keep ‘em at bay, asgore. we’ll be there.” Sans says softly, and hangs up, then looks up at you, a hint of apology in his eyes.

“What is it?” You as quietly, passing him his clothes. 

“at least four hundred, headed for tori. power’s out all downtown. cops might not know. cops might be part of it.” He breathes, dressing quickly. “tori might not know. not answering her cell. and frisk’s right in the middle.”


	80. In Which The Humans And Monsters Call This Whole Fight Off and Get Tea

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Make sure to check out the [CoBC Fanart Tag!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart) There's lots of great new stuff there - plus, Vivi (aka [Art and DETERMINATION](http://artanddetermination.tumblr.com)) drew the chapter 79 boobgrab and I know that's something we all need to see in closer detail.

You swallow slowly. “Oh… okay. Alright.” You say, your head spinning as you yank a shirt over your head. “Four hundred. Fuck. Sans.”

“i know. ‘s okay. could be more.” He says, quiet and focused. “we got a little time, too. they’re having a blast smashin’ up every monster-owned business downtown on their way.” 

“What’s the plan?” You say, quickly grabbing your shoes.

“asgore says they’re marching towards tori’s. got protest signs, like before, but… there’s so many. armed.” He growls. “you’re gonna get frisk out of there, okay? need you with ‘em.” You blink at him. 

“Um. Yeah. Of course. Where-”

“underground. safest.” He says, tugging a sneaker on. You can hear stirring out in the hall now - someone or something had woken the other monsters up. “i’ll open a door for you to snowdin. my old house. there’s a good hiding spot there, frisk will show you, if you need it. but, you hear anyone comin’ for you down there, you grab frisk and you keep running, clear?”

“You sure?” You murmur, glancing down over yourself to see if anything’s missing, if there’s anything you can think of that you might need in a scrap. You’re suddenly relieved that you feel practically overflowing with his magic, that it seems like it’s occupying every single empty space inside of you. You might very well need it. “You don’t need me to fight-”

“need you with frisk more.” He says, not unkindly. “i’ve got a bad feeling. two attacks on tori’s house? i mean, sounds like that’s where they’re goin’ tonight. and the kid who set ‘em free is living there? sounds like they want to make an example. i know you can fight, but you’re not ready for a real battle yet. if you need to take out a target with precision, that’s not something you can do yet. you can sure fuck a human up, but that’s not the end game tonight.” He says, and again, you wonder what he might have seen, the day you’d conjured that spear. “one thing we both know for sure you can do, though; you can let spot out, and you can run like hell. you can get frisk where nobody can touch ‘em, understand?” He whispers, standing up smoothly. “you too. you get clear, you stay safe, they tried to kill you once already. they don’t get another crack at it. launch them to the void, turn ‘em inside out, who knows what you can do, i don’t care, as long as you stay in one peace.”

You think back to your utter failure at throwing the spear with any kind of accuracy the other day, and nod. “What’ll you be doing?” You breathe, and he grits his teeth. 

“gettin’ everyone who can fight on the front lines. getting all the kids i can clear. i’ll try and send them your way.” He mutters, and you nod. 

“I can do that.” You say quietly. “Sans. They want you to make the first move.”

“don’t worry.” His eyes are shining hard. “not doing anything that’ll make me lose you. won’t let anyone else, either.” He rumbles, and he looks you over, his eyes lingering on yours, on your neck (throbbing very lightly still - he’d bitten you hard!), your soul, with that thousand yard gaze, then back up to your eyes. “keep your phone on.” he breathes, then suddenly rasps, “fuck!” before he takes two steps to close the distance between you, and kisses you fiercely, his hands knotted in your hair. You return the gesture, for that fleeting moment, holding him as tight as you dare before he releases you. “i love you.” He whispers, and you nod. 

“I love you too.” You whisper, trying not to choke on the fear and tension that’s forming a lump in your throat.

“you’re comin’ home to me.” He says, not a question, not an order, just a statement of fact. You nod at him. 

“You keep our friends and family safe. You keep yourself safe. You do that, and I will marry the hell out of you, whenever you want, however you want.” You say quickly, genuinely meaning it, and he lets out a hoarse, wild laugh, and mutters,

“mmm, let’s have that talk again when there’s not a mob of psychos tryin’ to hurt our frisk.” He whispers, and steals one last kiss before he pushes the door open; neither of you had bothered moving the armoire last night, which was probably for the best. 

Undyne and Alphys are already waiting there for you; Lesser Dog comes sailing up the stairs a few seconds later, and Papyrus emerges from his room down the hall only a heartbeat after that. You all look at each other for a heartbeat, then Alphys whispers, 

“I-I love you all.” 

“Me too.” You say immediately. 

“Yeah.” Undyne whispers. She’s wearing a suit of lightweight armor, and she looks absolutely vicious at the moment, her eye glinting with something barely contained.

“all of you.” Sans agrees. Lesser Dog whines, and Papyrus gulps and nods. “paps, you sure you wanna-”

“YES, SANS.” Papyrus cuts him off. “THEY NEED ME.” Sans meets his eyes, then nods back at him. 

“you do exactly what asgore says.” He demands. “ready, everyone?” 

“Wait.” Undyne grabs his shoulder, and then leans forward, and pins something onto his hoodie - it’s the aquarium volunteer pin. And inside- “A camera. Set to her phone. So she can-” Undyne nods at you, and Sans exhales. 

“ _thank you._ ” He whispers, clasping Undyne’s shoulder, then grimaces. “lessgo. tori’s house. we go in ready for anything.” 

_________________________________________

He slices a hole directly into Toriel’s living room, and all of you flinch slightly, startled, as the scene comes into view. There are three men laid out, unconscious, on the sweet little couch in the cottage. Toriel herself is taking up most of the hall that leads to Frisk’s room, crackling with fire magic and bristling with a barely contained snarl. She lets out a terrifying roar upon seeing you, charging forward, but she stops herself after only a step or two. 

“Oh. Oh thank goodness.” She whispers, and you all filter, silently, into her cottage. The door to your house snaps shut behind you. 

In the slight chaos that follows, you catch the gist of what had happened. They’d tried to break in through a window. They hadn’t reckoned with Alphys’ alarm system, however. They’d been laid out, unconscious, before they even had time to take another step. Toriel had bound their arms and legs tightly with rope, and had been preparing to wake Frisk when Sans’ portal had appeared in the hallway. She’s appraised of the plan by Sans, and she takes a long, steady look at you, before nodding and hugging you tight. 

“You will keep my child safe.” She whispers. Again, it’s not an order. It’s a statement of fact. “I will wake them.” She pads off down the hall, and you cast your gaze at Sans, who’s eying the unconscious men warily. 

“recognize ‘em?” He whispers. You study them. 

“Nope.” You mutter. He clenches his jaw. 

“me neither. how many of them _are_ there?” He hisses, then spins as Toriel returns, Frisk trailing sleepily behind them, looking small and bewildered and frightened. Your heart aches as you look at your little cousin. They’re still so tiny compared to other kids at eight years old, you think. Paula hadn’t fed them enough, you’re sure of it. She’d done the same with you, after all. 

“Hey bud. Ready to go to Sans’ house?” You whisper, and Frisk nods. Oh god, they’re wearing little striped footie pajamas. It’s enough to break your heart. 

“k. let’s go, kiddo.” Sans says, and then nods at Alphys. “you’re comin’ with me, bud.”

“Is Alphys-” You begin.

“I-I’m s-s-staying in my l-lab in H-Hotland.” She stutters rapidly. “I-I’ve b-been working on d-d-defensive…” She trails off and takes a slow breath. Sans nods. 

“we need her. but first stop, snowdin, right kiddo?” He gives Frisk a fake smile. Toriel, too, reaches over to ruffle Frisk’s hair, then, unable to restrain herself, bends over to kiss the top of their small head. 

**Yeah.** Frisk’s voice in your mind is weak, but they seem resigned. You smile at them, then take their hand. Sans slices a doorway into a warm, dark room, and immediately strides on ahead, working in the darkness, pulling all the shades shut before he turns on a small lamp. 

“c’mon in.” He mutters. You step through, holding Frisk’s hand, and look around, Alphys at your heels. The house is large, and airy, and obviously his. God, it smells like him - you’re not sure if that’s enough to set you at ease or to make your chest fill with worry again. It’s still fully furnished, which surprises you - there’s a couch, a table, a TV… doors lead off to a kitchen, and upstairs, two rooms that must have belonged to Sans and Papyrus. There’s one of his socks on the floor. “k. babe, i might be running some more kids through here. no humans are gonna get this deep, ‘cept you guys, of course. still. stay pretty quiet, don’t draw attention.” He mutters in your ear. You nod. “keep your phone on. i’ll find you soon as it’s safe.” He breathes, and kisses you fleetingly once more. You shiver, and he begins to slice another door, for Alphys. He’ll keep moving after that. “love you. both of you. you keep her safe, kid.” He tells Frisk with a crooked grin. Alphys gives you a miserable wave, and then they’re both out of sight, and it’s just you and your cousin alone in the dim, empty house. 

“Hey, bud.” You say, looking down at Frisk. “It’s really, really early. Do you want to get a little more sleep? I can wake you up if we need to go anywhere.” You wonder if you should just be telling Frisk it’s bedtime again, but… the look in their eyes always reminds you. They aren’t eight in there, sometimes. 

**No.** Frisk whispers in your brain. **Gotta be ready.** You flinch at their tone. 

“Is something coming?” You ask, looking down at their small face, their determined eyes. They just sound like they know something you don’t.

**Dunno. But down here, bad stuff can happen.** Frisk whispers, and you take a deep breath. 

“Okay.” You murmur, and then nod at them. “Sounds like we’ll probably have some more friends here soon, huh? Why don’t we find some blankets and stuff, you think, so that anyone who’s sleepy can go back to bed?” Frisk nods, thinking this over, and then takes your hand, tugging you upstairs. The first room at the top of the stairs, you immediately discover, is Papyrus’. “Oh. His car. Like his bed.” You whisper to yourself, something from months ago finally clicking. Frisk gives you a small smile, then nods at the closet. They’re right; there’s still lots of bedding in there, towels and pillows and blankets. There’s still a handful of his books there too, which you gather up in your arms, thinking that some kids might need more calming.

**Got it.** Frisk grabs an armful of bedding and trundles back downstairs. You take a breath, anxious about letting them out of your sight, and then steel your nerves and walk down the hallway into the other room, which must have been Sans’. Pushing the door open, you look around, and sigh slowly, your worst fears confirmed. This was not a room where a happy man had lived. It’s so dark, so dingy, so devoid of decoration. Oh, Sans. You glance around up here for supplies, but don’t spend a lot of time. Nothing’s going to be there -

**M.K.!** Frisk yelps from downstairs. In a heartbeat, you’re down there with them. You sigh, realizing that Sans must have just made a dropoff - Frisk’s friend, the one without arms, is standing by the couch, shivering and looking down at the ground. 

“Hey. Hey M.K. How you doing, bud?” You whisper, walking over and dropping to your knees, giving them a quick hug. “You remember me?” 

“Y-yeah.” M.K. squeaks. “You’re Frisk’s cousin.” 

“Yeah. Here you go, pal. You look chilly.” You say. M.K., too, is wearing pajamas, but they look a little more comfortable once they’re on the couch and bundled up with Frisk under a blanket. “Okay, bud, here’s the deal. If we see anything, hear anything, we’re gonna run. I’m gonna cut a doorway in the air, just like this, and you’re gonna dash through, okay?” You say, tracing a tiny doorway just so the kids can see. M.K eyes this nervously, but Frisk nods firmly, and that ends up being enough. 

Just then, a door opens again, just for a heartbeat, and you catch the quickest glimpse of him, feel that tiny pulse coming from his soul, but then two tiny, quivering bunny children are there, and the process of acclimating them starts over again. In the end, there’s at least twenty children; the eldest, two waterdrake twins in their tweens, the youngest, an absolutely beautiful husky puppy-monster slumbering in a carrying sling - Sans actually steps through to pass you this precious cargo, whispering, “outta time. last kid.” He looks at you, his eyes full of anxiety, and he whispers, “love you,” one last time.

“You too. Stay safe.” You beg, and he grits his teeth, then nods, ducking back through. The door closes behind him, and he’s gone, out of sight. Strapping the tiny puppy to your front, you look at your charges - so many little faces, tiny and scared and exhausted, and Frisk dead center in the crowd, a book in their hands, their eyes fixed with determination. 

**I’m going to read us a book now.** They call out, strong and silent, echoing only in your heads. **Everyone pay attention. This is called ‘Stars Are Real, Aren’t They?’** Frisk says, and one by one, the worried, murmuring children - some only moments away from tears - begin to tune in to Frisk’s story. 

This leaves you free, of course, to worry, and in the absence of new children arriving, you’re able to pull out your phone, finding the app that Alphys had set up for you, crossing your fingers; the scene flickers into view, and for a moment, you can’t make sense of what you’re seeing. The shapes resolve themselves into the forest, the dark woods around Tori’s house, but that’s all you know. God, there’s no sound. You can’t even hear him. You’re about to let out a distressed whine when the little puppy strapped to your chest whimpers and squirms, and you remember that you need to stay strong for the little ones that are counting on you right now. 

Perhaps thinking of you, Sans turns to the right, then the left, and your panic begins to subside as you see what he’s been up to: it’s no longer just your small group of friends up against the oncoming human horde. No, the monsters have come out in force tonight. There are dozens, maybe even a hundred, creating a tight circle all the way around Toriel’s cottage. Undyne is by Sans’ side, her eye flashing, a brilliant spear like you’ve never seen before clutched in her hand. On his other side is Papyrus, the skeleton’s eyes distant and focused and hugely intelligent, the version of Papyrus you’d only seen once before, the briefest glimmer. You gulp, and then, at once, it seems that Sans’ attention, that everyone’s attention, is commanded by something; the humans! you think, as the camera swings wildly around to capture two massive figures - the king and queen, standing hand in hand, addressing the host of monsters. God, you wish you knew what they were saying! Surely you could just… cut a window to Toriel’s, or something? 

You take a deep breath. No. You need to keep focused. All these little souls were under your charge right now. God, it was infuriating, in a way. This was like every bad story, every shitty movie, where the heroine had to hang back - with the children! - while the hero got down to the business of saving the day! But… fuck, you knew Sans was right, that you weren’t being left out because he didn’t have any faith in you. You were here because this was an important, no, an essential task that could be done very well by you. In fact, it was something that could be done by only you, at least while Sans was still the better fighter than you. And frankly, while you knew that the monsters would be doing their best to avoid killing the humans - they’d better be doing so, at least - that the possibility was that lives would be lost this night, and you didn’t know if that was something you were capable of doing. 

The puppy squirms, and Sans is staring at Toriel, then at Asgore. You begin picking out monsters you know on the tiny screen of your phone - Aaron, Whimsun, Grillby and his daughter, Heats, Ice Wolf… there’s so many others, too. Spry rabbits, dogs of all descriptions, a family of massive spiders - two little spiders are cuddled up with Frisk at the moment, these must be relatives - oh, there’s coyote monsters, bat monsters, creatures that looked like vegetables or moss or mold, tiny spindly creatures with massive, melon shaped heads, two female centaurs with muscles that Undyne would be jealous of…

There’s something moving in the trees behind the monsters. You gasp, then clap your hand to your mouth before you can get the kids’ attention. Frisk’s eyes flick to you, but they continue reading the book, showing all the monsters the page they’re on. You pretend to pay attention for a second, then stare back down at the screen, your eyes growing wide. The monsters have noted the movement, though - Sans is now facing the forest, and the camera is stock still as he waits for the nightmare to begin.

The humans begin to appear, all around the tight circle the monsters had formed. They filter out of the forest in lockstep, like… like they’ve been training. You shudder, tearing your eyes away from the screen to look over the kids for a second - still all there, still okay - and then you grimace, your hand twitching, thinking about how easy it would be to open a door, just to listen, but… well the last thing that was safe on a battlefield (if this were to become a battlefield) was a tiny floating space that could tear a chunk in anyone that happened to run through it. They’re coming out now, in ranks, in waves, human after human spilling out into the small clearing, and trailing back into the forest so deep it’s impossible to tell how many there are, these men and women, unsmiling and clad in black.

Some are holding signs, not with any particular amount of enthusiasm, but they have them. They say things like “This Is Our Land!”, “Magic Is An Act Of Terror!” “THEY ARE STEALING OUR WOMEN AND CHILDREN!” That last one makes you shudder. You can’t help but notice that, in addition to these posters, the carriers seem to all be holding something far more dangerous than mere words. There are….

There are so many guns. 

There are knives, too, stun guns, maybe things that are worse, maybe true explosives, but god, you just can’t stop counting the guns, the ones you can see on this tiny screen, and your heart aches with fear for Sans, for your whole family, for every monster there. They are clever, they can dodge, but this mob doesn’t care, and no matter how fast they are, you don’t think they can dodge bullets… and your man, you can still feel his teeth on your neck, that tender spot he’d left at some point (not half as tender as your heart right now, though, god, why had you grabbed his soul like that, why did you have to know how much you needed him to be whole?). You can still smell him, feel him, it’s like he’s in a haze all around you, but that’s just you, that’s just you panicking, because you can see now that the humans are chanting something, all in unison, you try to read the lips, and slowly you can make it out…

“BACK

WHERE 

THEY

BELONG”

The humans are working themselves into a frenzy, screaming and stomping. Even on the tiny screen, it’s terrifying. The monsters don’t seem to be moving at all, they’re silent, surrounded (‘targets,’ the word flashes into your head, ‘sitting ducks,’ ‘fish in a barrel’) …

Almost in slow motion, you see the hand with the gun begin to rise, you _feel,_ oh god, oh god, it’s pointed at him, oh god, you’re gonna lose him, he’s such a target, the skeleton who’s with the human girl, the one who’d helped steal Frisk from their mother, oh god, he’ll be the first, you know it, you know it, and then - 

Sans takes a step forward, the camera blurs and then fractures into little black squares, and when the image clears, he’s back where he was, but the man who had been raising the gun is gunless, and bewildered, and clearly about to scream bloody murder when, on the other side of the cottage, there’s movement once more, another wave of bodies, oh god… More and more humans come in from the woods, and your stomach plummets - nobody could beat these odds, they’re all going to die! They’re all gonna die, and you’re going to watch. 

And then you see him - sprinting forward, right to Aaron’s side, the small, slight frontrunner of the new human arrivals, and you suddenly begin to breathe again. 

It’s Tommy. He’s at the lead of… god, hundreds more humans, in red or orange or any color close enough to that general shade, anything that could differentiate them from the mob of violent protesters, and you realize at once what this means, as these humans form a shield, a wall around the monsters, facing out, blocking any clear shot at a monster. They’re forming a human barrier. These humans are allies. They’re the reinforcements. And then, spotlights. Helicopters, and police are rappelling down, or is that the army, and ….

**What’s happening?** Frisk asks from your elbow, and you crack a huge grin, looking at Frisk and the tiny monsters that you’re caring for, and, staggered with relief, you whisper, 

“The humans. We showed up. For once, we showed up when the monsters needed us. It’s gonna be okay.” You breathe in slowly, savoring the scent of the air, the sense of him, knowing that the monsters will be okay as… god, it’s not just hundreds, it must be _thousands_ , new humans continue to spill onto the scene, and the people in black know the odds, they’re fleeing, and suddenly, you’re very, very tired. 

“Did we win?” M.K. wants to know, and you look around at all the anxious little eyes, and you give them a reassuring smile. 

“We didn’t lose.” You say. Maybe, for tonight, that’s enough.


	81. In Which Things Just Keep Getting Woooorse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there is [more f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

You wait, as you’d promised, in Sans’ old home, keeping an eye on the exhausted children. They seem to sense that things really are going to be okay for now - the smallest kids are already, finally, fast asleep. Frisk is practically buried under their friends right now, snuggled up with so many monsters in a cuddle pile that had overflowed the couch and spread onto the floor. They were all so sweet; the little bat fox, sucking on his thumb (or was that a dew claw), the wood elemental, resembling a pile of leaves in sleep... oh, there, another, older pup, their tail wagging in their sleep, even though they kept threatening to jerk awake, and then there were the little spiders, hugging each other with multiple pairs of arms, and a little… was that a cat? A dog? Whatever it was, they were cute. They all were. All these little souls, all in need of protection. 

You sigh, resisting the urge to wake the newborn puppy in the sling around your neck by petting it, and looking over at all the children who wouldn’t know war this day because humans had risen to the occasion. For the first time in a long time, you feel a swell of pride. Your species had demonstrated nonviolence, bravery, and compassion. For once, humans had defended monsters. They had put their own lives and safety on the line to do the right thing. They’d shown the men and women who had grabbed guns and dressed in black what true humanity was. 

You still can’t stop checking your phone. Sans is still deep in the throng of monsters and humans, last you checked, giving statements (the police had indeed showed up at the scene of the riot, and, perhaps to avoid any accusation of impropriety, they seemed to be interviewing everyone). It might be a while. With a sigh, looking at the mass of sleeping (or nearly sleeping) children, you sink to the floor, your back resting against the side of the sofa. Almost immediately, you’re drawn into the drowsy mass of little monsters - a puppy wiggles its way over to be near the infant you’re still carrying and falls asleep with her head nestled against your side a moment later. A few more stragglers follow suit, and soon it’s all you can do to keep your eyes open, feeling limp with relief that nobody had been hurt, that your species had been decent, that your family was still -

“hey.” You don’t even jump. You’d been waiting for him, and all you feel is relief when his voice cuts through the sounds of twenty-odd kids making small, nighttime noises. You don’t think you’ve ever heard him sound so gentle before. You look up, and feel that last tiny bit of tension drain from your body as you see Sans, standing a few feet away and watching you. He looks so exhausted, so relieved to see you, that all you want to do is scramble to your feet and greet him properly, but you’ve got four or five sleeping monsters clinging to you, so it takes a few minutes to extricate yourself properly. He watches, a soft smile on his face the entire time, and offers you a hand when you’re more or less free, pulling you smoothly up to your feet. He doesn’t release your hand once you’re standing. 

“Hey.” You whisper, and then you exhale very slowly, looking him over. He’s really okay. You can’t find the words, the way to express your gratitude for this. He’s looking at you like he might have the exact same thoughts right now, and for a second you’re both silent, just watching each other and feeling such relief, relief like you didn’t know a person could feel. Finally, you speak up again. “You kept everyone safe.” He lets out a quiet laugh. 

“mmm, pretty sure that i’ve got a buncha humans in orange shirts to thank for that.” He says wryly. 

“The guy, the gun-” You begin quietly, too aware of the children.

“took care of it.” He murmurs, then gives you a crooked smile. “i made a promise i’d come back. i keep ‘em.” He whispers, and you see then that he’d been prepared to face anything, every single human, no matter what, just as long as he honored that pledge to you. You sigh, and lean forward to kiss his forehead - there would be time for more kissing later, sure, but he seems to understand that this would have to stand in for several big, huge, enormous emotions that you couldn’t very well express right now. He smiles at you, and you stand there for another long moment, just watching him and feeling blissful. “everything ok here?”

“Yeah. Frisk was great. Read the kids a book, kept ‘em busy.” You say, and he smiles again. 

“good. frisk is gonna come back home with us, k? tori too.” He whispers, and you nod. 

“Of course.” You agree. He smiles at you, then nods at the sling around your neck. 

“think there’s some parents who wanna see these guys.” He murmurs, and you chuckle, looking at your charges. 

“Yeah. Let’s get everyone home.” You whisper, and he cuts the first of many doors to prearranged meeting points. This time, you pay close attention to where he’s going, which monsters he meets there. The next time, if there is a next time, the more people who could help get the monsters together and the kids safe, the better. 

\-------------------------------------------------

It takes nearly two hours to get all the kids home safe with their parents. By the end, both you and Sans are clearly on your last, last legs. You wave goodbye at the spider clan - part of the reason it had taken so long was that every single parent and loved one felt the need to show you just how much they appreciated you protecting the kids - and then turn to Sans. “Home?” You beg, your voice scratchy. You’d sent Frisk back into Tori’s arms nearly an hour ago, and there’s nobody left but you two in the Snowdin house. 

“mhm.” He’s dead on his feet - it has to be you who makes the final shortcut home, into the family room. It’s maybe four AM, so it would have been fine if you were the last ones up, but no, everyone’s crowded in there, waiting. A quiet murmur of greeting rises from the various people who are still awake, strewn around the room on every bit of furniture, as you finally arrive. Your eyes dart around, you can’t help it, checking to make sure every single person is there - Undyne, Alphys, Toriel, Frisk, Papyrus, Lesser Dog. Okay. Okay. 

“what’s the news?” Sans blearily nods at the TV, and Undyne smiles sleepily, patting the spot on the couch next to her and Alphys. 

“Mettaton’s gonna be on.” She whispers. “C’mon. Welcome home.” You smile at her, sure your exhaustion is showing on your face, and you take up your position on the couch once again, feeling miles and miles away from the person you’d been just a few hours ago, making out on the couch with Sans. You yawn, and curl in between Undyne and Sans - the latter makes a soft, content noise when you settle your head on his shoulder. Papyrus, Toriel and Frisk are all asleep on the other sofa, and Lesser Dog and Ghost are both sleeping, curled up, on the ground. Undyne passes the two of you a blanket, and you close your eyes, just for a second…

When you open them again, it’s sunny, the TV’s still on, muted, and there’s the sound of soft voices coming from the hallway that leads to the kitchen. You glance slowly around; Undyne and Alphys are gone, as is Toriel. Frisk and Papyrus are still asleep on the other sofa, and Sans hasn’t moved; you’re still resting your head on his shoulder. 

“hey.” He whispers, and you realize, no, he has moved, his arm is around you now, tightening slightly as you stir. 

“Hey. Morning.” You murmur, curling a little closer. “Sorry, I fell asleep-”

“me too. ‘s okay.” He assures you. “mettaton’s here.”

“Oh! Good.” You say, feeling faintly pleased - it’s been too long since you’ve seen your friend. “What did I miss?”

“guess the press was pretty good. poor tommy’s on every newspaper on earth, i think.” You grimace. You know what that feels like. “they caught like fifteen of them. no sticking arrests, except for some gun violations, trespassing… they didn’t technically do anything.” Sans mutters. 

“Fifteen? That’s all?” You whisper, blinking, and pull your head from his shoulder to look at him. 

“yeah. they disappeared fast. like… insanely fast. human cops were yelling for monsters to stay put, and there just wasn’t enough police…” He whispers, consciously staying quiet enough to avoid from waking Papyrus and Frisk. 

“...Darn.” You whisper, which makes him smile, seeing you fumble for something that isn’t a curse word in front of Frisk. 

“mmhm.” He agrees, and curls into you, his other arm moving around your waist. “capra’s been on the news all morning. he’s organizing a clean-up day today for all the monster businesses that got trashed. and a fund. he donated a lot.” He whispers. 

“Oh! Good. Can we go? Or do we have to go in-”

“no work today. we can go.” He assures you, and kisses your shoulder carefully. “want food?” You think about this, then nod. 

“Yeah. Yeah, I could eat. I don’t really want to move though.” You admit. “Liking you right here. I thought I was going to lose you.” He swallows, hugging you, and whispers, the quietest yet. 

“me too. for a second.” Your heart pounds when he says that, and you let him hold you tightly for a while, slowly stroking his back. Finally, he looks up at you, the light back in his eye. “i’ve got no plans on wanderin’ too far from you today, promise.” He whispers. You nod, and suddenly, he grins. “i mean, i kinda gotta. we’ve got a wedding to plan.” He teases, and you groan quietly, squirming loose. 

“No teasing!” You scold quietly, your cheeks heating up so spectacularly that you don’t know what to do with yourself. “I… I mean…”

“shh.” He’s trying not to look amused. He’s failing spectacularly. “just a joke. i know you didn’t mean it, really, it was just-”

“What? I mean, no, uh, I- I did mean it, I-” You’re struggling for words, and he’s sitting there, an honestly surprised expression on his face, the briefest glimmer of glee beginning to replace it when Papyrus stirs across the room; your voices had gotten too loud.

“IS EVERYTHING OKAY?” He demands, and of course, Frisk stirs too, and Sans has instant mercy on you. 

“everything’s perfect.” He assures them. “you guys ready for breakfast?” He’s grinning in a way that’s much too enthusiastic for just breakfast, but Papyrus doesn’t question it, bouncing to his feet and grabbing Frisk under one arm. 

“WE’RE ALWAYS READY!” He brags, hurrying over to offer a hand to pull you to your feet. You grin, still feeling quite warm, and accept it - god, Papyrus is strong, he pulls you up like you’re nothing! - and then smile at Sans when he shambles to his feet and takes your other hand. The two of you follow Frisk and Papyrus down the hall into the kitchen, Sans slowly swinging your hand the whole way. 

Toriel’s been baking - oh god, she’s been busy this morning, because there’s bread and muffins and croissants (how? didn’t it take forever to make the dough for some of this stuff?) and fruit and eggs, and basically, as usual when Toriel is involved, it looks like a high end restaurant brunch has been plopped down on the kitchen island.

“Oh! There you are, darling!” Mettaton bounces straight up from his seat, and hurries right over, ignoring Sans entirely to give you an enormous hug. “I heard how brave you were last night, protecting all those children while I was safe behind the camera-”

“I didn’t even do anything, it was basically babysitting-”

“like hell it was, all those parents were able to be with us because they knew their kids would be safe with you!” Sans interjects before anyone else can, and you give him a small, tolerant smile, though all things considered, your contribution seems ridiculous to you. 

“B-Besides, Mettaton, you were the one who rounded up all those humans. Oh, _______, h-he did a broadcast, I, um, I patched him into all the local channels from my lab, and they d-did it, the humans came just like we hoped!” Alphys chirps from the end of the table, and Undyne grins. 

“Yeah you did! You scienced the heck out of those TVs, baby!” She says proudly, and Toriel beams at all of you, pulling a tray of scones out of the oven. 

“You were all wonderful, each and every one of you.” She says softly. “Last night was a triumph for all of us. For humans and monsters both.” She says, giving you a particularly warm look. 

“Speaking of which. Darling. Sidebar.” Mettaton says, and takes your hand, forcibly tugging you back down into the hall. 

“uh, hey bud, i’m-”

“Oh, Sans, don’t be ridiculous, I’ll return her in just a minute!” Mettaton scoffs, pulling you out of earshot. You want to whine - you don’t want to be out of sight of him right now! - but you realize you’re being silly. “There we are.” Mettaton dusts his hands off primly when you’re back in the family room. 

“Mettaton.” You grumble. “I’m hunnnngry.” 

“Just one question!” Mettaton insists. “There’s a man who’s been on the news all morning. Undyne and Alphys say he’s your boss!” You blink. 

“Oh, right, Capra. I mean, technically, sure-”

“Is he single?” Mettaton demands. You stare at him. He stares at you. 

“Oh hell no. I’m not ready for this today.” You mutter, and shake your head, ignoring Mettaton’s complaints, to stomp back into the kitchen and begin hatching plans to make sure they never meet.


	82. In Which Capra Has Some Chill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the funniest thing that has [ever happened or ever will happen.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/142673236606/gosh-darn-it-mod)

“what’d he-” 

“Tell you later.” You walk back into the kitchen, immediately returning to Sans’ side. He squints dubiously at you, particularly when Mettaton comes in to join you a moment later, clearly in a snit. 

“You didn’t need to be rude.” He complains, looking haughtily at you. You give him your most scornful look in return, eyebrows raising.

“I absolutely did.” You mutter darkly, and then turn to Sans. “You need to eat something this morning, babe.” 

“was gonna.” He says sulkily, which tells you that he probably wasn’t. You pout at him until he sighs and reaches around you to the kitchen table and picks up a muffin, masticating it grotesquely just to make a point, letting you see a mouthful of sharp teeth and lemon-poppyseed with every bite, an obnoxious grin on his face. 

...And you were going to marry this idiot. 

“Oh, god.” You mutter under your breath, grabbing an apple and a croissant for yourself. Undyne chuckles, perhaps reading your mind, then says, 

“We’d better get going downtown once you guys have eaten. There’s a lot of work to do. Grillby’s, Muffet’s Bakery, Gerson’s Antiques… I hear they’re almost totally gutted on the inside. God knows how much old junk- uh, antiques… Gerson lost, I’m gonna ask to be assigned to helping him.” Your heart plummets. You don’t know Gerson, but you certainly knew Grillby, and you’d just met Muffet last night, exhausted and worried and so, so grateful to you that the little spider twins had been returned safe and unharmed. 

“we’re gonna do grillby’s.” Sans nods at you, then smiles at Frisk. “you wanna stick with us, bud? bet you’re pretty handy with a dustpan.” Frisk nods sleepily, and you squint at them. Should Frisk really be going outside, after it sure had seemed like a bunch of people had tried to get them?

“safest place for a monster to be, right now, i think.” Sans says, reading your mind. “or a monster’s friend. there’s gonna be so many monsters and human allies downtown - kinda hate to say it, but capra really came through in the clutch. saw it on the news. he’s got the police doing security, got lunch catered in for the volunteers, there’s a stage, live music, they’re collecting donations… it’s gonna be a big thing.” 

“Still. Don’t go wandering too far, pipsqueak. You stick with Uncle Skeleton and Aunt Skarm.” Undyne warns Frisk, as you take a big bite of croissant and then groan appreciatively at Toriel. God, she could bake! Frisk rolls their eyes at Undyne’s warning (and you roll your eyes at ‘Aunt Skarm,’) but they nod again. 

“Undyne is right, my child. You must stay close to your cousin and Sans, if you do want to help clean up with them.” Toriel says, then turns to you. “I am afraid that I will be in diplomatic meetings for the next few days. While last night was a nightmare, it appears to have opened something of a dialogue.” She says cautiously. 

“told tori that she could stay with us.” Sans pipes up. “for however long she needs. meetings might run late now that they’re actually talkin’ to asgore and her, and she needs to know frisk’s gonna be safe, so i said we’d be able to take ‘em to school and stuff-”

“Oh, god, yeah, of course!” You say, smiling at Toriel, then at Sans, feeling pleased that he had felt comfortable enough to extend the invitation. It was his home too, after all, and it was nice to see him actually acting like it. “As long as you need, Tori. Asgore is… welcome here too, of course.” You falter just a little, thinking of the way that Asgore had acted in your last encounter with him, but fortunately, Toriel doesn’t notice. 

“Thank you so much, my niece. It is a relief to know that my child will be protected.” She says quietly, then adds, “And goodness, regardless of my husband’s concerns, I must say that I am pleased that Mr. Capra has organized this event! To see so many humans working with monsters to set things right... I had not dared even to dream that this might happen. 

“least he could do. didn’t see him out there wearin’ orange last night.” Sans says dryly, and you lean against him, kissing the top of his head. 

“He was probably asleep, baby.” You point out. “Or... otherwise occupied, anyway. Besides. He wasn’t out there wearing black, either. Point for Capra.” Well, that was actually an awfully low bar, but considering what Capra was doing now to organize, you’d take it. 

“always seein’ the best in people…” Sans grumbles goodnaturedly, winding his arm around your waist. You smile cheerfully at him, admitting it. Yeah, yeah. You saw the best in people. You could have worse personal failings. Besides… oh, damn it, you were still in just the best mood, seeing him, all of them, safe and laughing and comfortable in your kitchen, when mere hours ago you’d been braced to watch them enter into battle. 

“S-seeing the best in people is a g-good quality, you know.” Alphys laughs, looking at the two of you, and Sans shrugs. 

“suppose it is. never woulda suckered her into dating me in the first place if she didn’t see the best in me, at least.” He says, and you grin at him. 

“DON’T GO FISHING FOR COMPLIMENTS, SANS!” Papyrus scolds. “YOU ARE A WONDERFUL BROTHER AND YOU’RE PROBABLY A PRETTY OKAY BOYFRIEND.” You have to giggle at that. 

“He’ll do.” You assure Papyrus, and finish your croissant. “Okay, let me just change clothes really quick and we’ll all head downtown and get to work, yeah?” The monsters nod in assent, and you all head off in separate directions to take whatever preparations were necessary for a day of labor. Sans is still attached to you, his arm moving only slightly from your waist to the small of your back, and you can’t help but sigh in relief for the moment when the bedroom door closes behind you and, finally, it really is just the two of you. He feels it too. He looks at you with hard, bright eyes, and you lean into his hold to kiss him properly at last, arms moving around his ribcage to hug him tightly even once you’ve pulled away. It takes you a long while to move away, though. His mouth is eager and familiar, the magic behind his unseen lips still causing a spark of delight all through you, even after all this time.

The lights in his eyes don’t move from yours, and he takes a second before he can speak again. “i knew it more than ever last night. surrounded by humans with guns who came to hurt us, and all i could think about was you. if you were ok. if you were watching. how i could keep everyone safe for you.” He whispers. “that was the only option, you know? that i’d do it. no matter what, i was gonna make it work so that you were okay. i was ready to… god, i don’t know, anything. coulda torn the universe in half, if that’s what it took to keep my promise.” He’s so serious right now, without even that faint flicker of humor in his eyes that's almost always there. You nod slowly, and he lets out a soft chuckle. “i know we’re… a lot to handle, after we touch each other’s souls. an’ last night, fuck, babe…” He swallows, then mutters, helplessly, “you made my goddamn soul come, ‘s what it felt like-”

“Sans!” You burst out laughing, shaking your head, and he grins at you and shrugs. 

“nah. that’s not really it. not entirely. i’ll show you sometime.” He promises, giving you a wicked smirk, but then grows more serious. “just, you know… i want to always be part of you. i want to always be here.” He’s serious again, resting his hand above your heart, your soul. 

“Oh…. Sans, is this-” You suddenly realize this might not just be a relieved talk between two lovers who’d finally gotten a heartbeat of privacy, this might be something bigger, permanent, and you look at him like he might have a ring box tucked away somewhere, a thrill running through you. 

“heh, no. not yet.” He knows what you’re thinking. You’re simultaneously relieved and disappointed, and he lets out another soft chuckle. “but this is me tellin’ you that, you know, that’s coming. if that’s ok, if it’s what you want. i don’t wanna misread things, an’ i know that this is kinda crazy, that we’re moving so fast, i’m pretty sure even yesterday you weren’t ready-”

“It’s okay. It’s what I want.” You hush him quickly, and again, that huge, incredulous smile crosses his face. “After last night… I don’t want to waste time, just to be proper. I don’t want to have to pretend that this isn’t what I want. You say that when monsters make that promise to get married, that there’s no changing your mind later, right? That you’re pledged to that person forever and ever.”

“right.” He says instantly, watching you so closely that you can practically feel the weight of his gaze. 

“Okay then. That’s what I want. I don’t… I don’t ever want to feel the way I did last night again.” You say slowly, choosing your words carefully. 

“how did you feel last night?” He asks, paying just as careful attention. 

“Like I might lose you. I might have lost you, and you wouldn’t have known, you might not have understood how entirely and completely I am yours.” You say, taking a deep breath, and he shakes his head. 

“i knew. i know.” He says, though he sounds a little disbelieving all the same. 

“Then I want you to know for sure that, as long as I have half a choice in the matter, you’re not gonna lose me. And I want to know the same for you.” You breathe, and he nods slowly. 

“you know things will always be a little different for us.” He mutters, and you nod. 

“I’m counting on it.” You assure him, and he grins crookedly, before he says, 

“not just the fun stuff, though. like… i dunno if we can have kids, if you ever want ‘em. i know you’re nowhere near ready right now-”

“We’ll figure it out. There’s lots of ways. Lots of kids out there that need homes too.” You say with a shrug. “When we’re ready, you’re gonna be the best damn dad-” He flushes at that, a brilliant blue, and you have just enough time to gather that you’ve said something he’s desperately needed to hear, because he crushes his lips to yours, holding you tightly, and it’s suddenly all you can do not to just block the door and spend the rest of the day showing him your love, but then you hear Undyne’s voice, soft and unusually tactful, calling, 

“Hey guys, you ready?” Oops. Right, you’d been supposed to be changing. You part from him, giving him an apologetic smile, and call back,

“Two seconds!” He gives you rather a forlorn look when you inch away from him to change your clothes, and you chuckle at him. 

“Aw, don’t give me that look. There’s no rush. We’ve got the rest of our lives, right?” You remind him, and he perks right back up. 

“heh. yeah. suppose we do.” 

\--------------------------------------------------------

Downtown is….

Well, it’s hard to say. 

Part of you is horrified. You’d seen pictures on your phone last night, of the mob swarming through downtown, captured on CCTV and sneaky cellphone shots from terrified residents in upstairs apartment. You’d seen the pictures, but it hadn’t done it justice. 

All in all, there weren’t that many monster owned establishments. There certainly weren’t enough to satisfy the slavering mob. So, businesses that employed monsters, that happily served monsters, apartment buildings that monsters regularly visited, they all had been targeted as well, and it turned out, in retrospect, that this meant damn near every building downtown, more or less. 

Looking at all the smashed windows, the smeared graffiti on brick walls or sharpied onto door frames, windows, wooden signs (“BACK WHERE THEY BELONG” “OUR TOWN OUR COUNTRY OUR PLANET”), the hundreds of propaganda brochures that littered the streets like they’d been airdropped in, it was hard not to feel horrified and disgusted at your fellow humans. It was almost too much, almost made you want to cry and give up, but then there’s the other thing, the thing you can hardly believe:

Main Street is absolutely packed with humans (and naturally, monsters) ready to volunteer. You don’t think you’ve ever seen the town this full, even in peak tourist season, even on festival days with fireworks. You see some of them are familiar faces; other employees at EbbCo, or people you knew from school, from growing up in the area. So many, though, are strangers to you, strangers who cared enough to come out and make a difference and show the world what the humans of Mt. Ebott really had to offer.

“Gosh.” Undyne says at your elbow, sounding a little choked up. You share the sentiment. Sans inhales through his teeth, then rests his hand on Frisk’s head, ruffling their hair. Frisk pouts at this, and Mettaton clicks his tongue, shooing Sans’ hand away to restore order to Frisk’s hair, producing a comb out of nowhere. 

“L-looks like there’s s-sign up sheets and t-tools and s-s-stuff over there, guys.” Alphys sounds absolutely frazzled. Of course, Alphys does not enjoy large crowds, not one bit.

“alph, you sure you-”

“I’m f-fine, Sans. T-Thank you.” She assures him quickly. “I um, I j-just need to g-get to work and I’ll be able t-to tune it out.” 

“Let me get us signed up then, sweetie-” Undyne begins, but she’s cut off by a low cry of:

“ _There_ you guys are!”

You glance at Sans. He looks utterly resigned to this happening, squeezing your hand as Capra emerges from the crowd, which parts in front of him like minnows darting from a shark. Capra looks so pleased to see you for a second that you almost feel guilty, and then he seems to suddenly realize that he shouldn’t be so happy, and adopts a somber expression that makes you feel even guiltier! For once, he’s not wearing a suit - no, you’d seen him in this outfit before, a tight black t-shirt that seems designed to show exactly how lean he was, dark jeans that fit just a little too well, and, oh god, Chuck Taylors, just like Sans’, those were new...

(“Oh my...” Mettaton breathes, slow and delighted, from right behind you.)

“hey capra.” Sans says, and you smile, giving him a wave. “you were waiting for us?”

“No. Well, yes. Well - holy shit, _________, did they find you last night?” He trails off from his rapid, excited patter to stare at you, looking upset. 

“Huh?” You blink. Capra gestures vaguely at your neck, and suddenly you remember sharp teeth, your hand around your man’s soul while he-

“Ah, no! It’s nothing!” You say quickly, your cheeks heating. Why did this keep happening?! (Well, _______, it kept happening because you absolutely loved it when Sans bit your neck, but that was neither here nor there because right now you were in the biggest crowd you’d ever seen in this town and your boss was looking at you like was ready to beat up the bad man who had hurt you…) Undyne observes this and begins to snicker _very_ unkindly, and Sans lets out a low growl at her. Capra stares, uncomprehending, and Sans quickly changes the subject.

“hey, bud, these are our friends. uh, this is undyne and her fiance alphys,” Capra’s eyes light up, first at the realization that he’s being allowed into this portion of your life, and then again when he hears alphys’ name, “and, uh, my brother, papyrus-”

“HELLO HUMAN! IT’S SO NICE TO FINALLY MEET YOU! SANS HAS SOME NICE THINGS TO SAY ABOUT YOU AND ALSO SOME VERY BAD THINGS!” Papyrus says happily. Capra takes this in, then bursts out laughing.

“Fair enough. Who’s the kiddo?” 

“Oh, my cousin, Frisk.” You say quickly, smiling at them as you introduce them. “Frisk, this is my boss.”

“And friend!” Capra interjects cheerfully. Frisk bites their lip and then signs to you, 

“ **Is he really your friend? I thought it wasn’t normal to be friends with your boss. Like how Burgerpants hates Mettaton?** ” 

“Frisk! I am RIGHT HERE!” Mettaton squawks, terribly insulted. Capra snorts, and squats down a little to meet Frisk’s eyes better, before astonishing you by signing back, 

_Probably a little weird. Good call, squirt._ Frisk’s eyes go wide, and then they beam at Capra, nodding, as Sans, sounding delighted,

“woah, buddy, you never told me you could sign?”

“You never asked-”

“And I’m Mettaton. Yes, _the_ Mettaton.” Mettaton says very loudly, absolutely fed up with the lack of attention he’s receiving. Capra looks up, at first a little annoyed until he gets a proper look at Mettaton. Then… oh, goddamn it, he is practically drooling, and you don’t need magic to read his thought process - a monster, that meant magic, and a robot, that meant technology, and a television star, that meant power, and he was _hot_ -

“oh goddammit.” Sans whispers, clearly having an identical realization, as they look at each other for just a little too long. 

“Peter Capra. My card. We should talk.” Capra fishes into his pocket, producing a business card that Mettaton accepts, his fingers deliberately brushing against Capra’s. He looks at it for a second, then passes it back to Capra, who looks hurt for a second before Mettaton murmurs, 

“I stored it, thank you, darling.” 

“You mean, you can - with your eyes - oh that is so fucking cool, gah! Sorry kid!” Capra remembers his company too late, and then remembers that he had been introduced to Alphys, quickly pivoting to say, “Oh, and Dr. Alphys, I’ve heard so much about your work, I’d love to chat sometime, here’s my card…” He passes the same one over to her, Undyne looking bemused, until Sans clears his throat and says,

“uh, anyway, we were about to get to work. you know. this thing you organized. which, you know, thanks? and thanks for the day off and stuff?” Capra suddenly focuses, and looks seriously at Sans. 

“Some humans did a really shitty, awful thing last night. Uh, sorry kid.” He signs that as he says it. “Anyway. It’s our responsibility as a species to show that we’re better than that. And look at all these people who came out here!” He gestures broadly, suddenly exultant. “We _are_ better than that. All of these people are going to leave here today, dedicated to proving that. We’re going to work together, humans and monsters, magic and science, and it is going to change this planet for the better.” He says confidently. 

Mettaton swoons so hard he nearly faints. 

\-------------------------------------------------------------

You, Sans and Frisk report to Grillby’s, fearing the absolute worst. As it turns out… well, it’s not as terrible as it could have been. Most of the fixtures inside the bar proved just too sturdy to ruin. You find out later that they’d tried to burn the place when it couldn’t be smashed or destroyed, but that, of course, hadn’t worked. Grillby had a non-flammable policy in the bar for obvious reasons, and even though they’d tried to burn grain alcohol, and then, in desperation, kerosene, Grillby’s magic had kept the place safe. 

That didn’t mean it was without damage, though. Most of the glassware behind the bar has been smashed, many of the bottles looted, but people are hard at work cleaning it up. A Madjick is fiddling with the jukebox, looking totally focused - the entire bar lets out a cheer when something sparks and music begins playing. As for the walls;

“Hey, Frisk. You wanna paint with me?” You say, wrinkling your nose at the graffiti covering the walls. It’s all nasty, but nothing Frisk hasn’t seen or heard before. Frisk nods, and the two of you head over to join the painting crew. Sans has been drafted into carpentry, since he’s good with his hands (oh, he certainly is), which he only grumbles about for a second, unhappy about being separated even by a few feet, before he dives into his task with a vengeance.

The rest of the day passes incredibly quickly. You all break for lunch - pizza, burgers and dogs, all of it magic and purchased by Capra from one of the monster owned restaurants that had avoided damage from being outside of the town center, dive back into work, and before you know it, you’re breaking again for dinner, and Grillby’s looks… it’s not the same, of course, but it does look nice. Just scarred now, since some damage couldn’t be repaired. 

Grillby’s been out all day - Capra had paid for Gerson, Grillby and his family, Muffet, a few Temmies, and a handful of monsters you’d yet to meet to be taken to a vineyard and spa a half hour away, with the caveat that they weren’t to return until you all got their stores back in order. Late that evening, when it’s just you, Sans, Frisk and ten or so stragglers left, fiddling with minor cosmetic improvements, he returns, looking anxious as he peers around the rear entrance. He flares with relief when he sees the condition of the bar (the kitchen, too, had taken some work but had been reassembled). He begins to crackle with thanks, and Sans translates quietly for the group of hardy humans that remained - some of them had really started to take a shine to him, you could tell from the way they smiled as he spoke. Frisk beams too, proud of the hard day’s work they’d put in, and it makes you grin, the delighted look on their face when Grillby comes over to thank them in particular, wrapping them in a warm hug. You get the same treatment moments later and sigh happily; Grillby’s quite reserved, so this means a lot, and your boyfriend watching you proudly means an awful lot as well. 

\--------------------------------------

“humans can be pretty ok, you know?” He asks you late that night, as the two of you walk down the beach in your backyard, enjoying the warm weather and the clear night. “i mean, not just you and frisk. that biker guy, he’d never even met a monster before me and he still came to help. and that shop teacher, he was cool. maybe this’ll actually work out. i mean, maybe.” He looks over the horizon, and you see that treacherous, beautiful thing that’s happening in his head; he’s allowing himself to hope.

“Maybe it will.” You whisper, and pledge silently to yourself that you’ll do everything in your power to keep that scrap of hope alive.


	83. In Which You Have A Fancy Date Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so I got a scolding email from Ao3 about self promotion the other day, so I've had to scrub all my dirty dirty dirty dealings off of the website. As a result, if you want that good old fashioned self-promosh, you're gonna have to go to [my tumblr](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com), which is chock full, promise. 
> 
> ALSO, in case you missed it, there's another chapter in [Delete or Be Deleted](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6122618/chapters/14987596), which takes place during the events of chapters 79 and 80 and is sad.

If Sans holds you a little closer, watches your back a little more carefully after the attack on Toriel’s house, you don’t exactly mind. It takes you a day or two to realize that you’re doing the same thing, texting him much more frequently during the workday - well, texting EVERYONE much more frequently. You know that Toriel’s able to keep an eye on Frisk during the schoolday, but you’ve been leaving early to pick them up from school so Toriel can go to her meetings with Asgore, which leaves Sans alone at work, and then Undyne’s still at the aquarium, and Alphys is on her own at the college and Papyrus still has to drive home from Asgore’s, and it’s… 

It’s a little nervewracking. 

Your training sessions - if that’s what they are - have also suddenly become much more serious. “feel better when i know you can take care of any human tryin’ to mess with you.” Sans explained, when he returned home from work and immediately dragged you outside, the day after the humans had all cleaned up downtown? “try that spear thing again?”

And you’d been trying, honestly. You had been. You’d been trying for two nights now, right up until it got too dark to see. You could pull something that was pretty much like a spear (sometimes, it wasn’t quite as sharp as Sans would have liked) from the air consistently now. It was a little draining, but, hey, Sans was willing to make sure you never felt _too_ drained. Er.

It was the whole throwing a spear at a target thing you were still just sucking at! The audience of Frisk, Spot, Sans, Undyne and Papyrus (and sometimes Lesser Dog) didn’t exactly help, but you were pretty sure you weren’t messing up because you were self-conscious, you were messing up because this just _wasn’t something humans were meant to do._

Still, by the time that Friday’s arrived and you still can’t manage to do much more than wave a spear menacingly, you’re about ready to call it quits. When Sans comes stepping into the family room, where you and Frisk are trying to drown out a frustrating day at work and school, respectively, with cartoons and chocolate milk, and immediately glances outside at the gruesome snow targets Papyrus had erected for you, clearing his throat, you groan at look up at him. 

“Baby, can we not today? I really need a break. I’m going nuts. I’m seeing those stupid tomato souls in my sleep.” You sigh, and he grits his teeth. 

“babe, you gotta-”

“Look, if there’s trouble, it’s not like I don’t have Spot, right?” You point out. “But I’ve clearly got like, a block here or something, and I don’t think doing the same thing over and over again is helpful. Please?” You beg. He sighs, and plops down on the couch next to you. 

“yeah. i know you’ve got spot.” He agrees unhappily. “and you can always make a door. i just… know that you can do it.” He says, his voice flat, and you think back to the spear’s first appearance, how he’d made a shortcut across the playground to stop you from doing something stupid. The more you thought about it, the more certain you were that you had done something VERY stupid, and he’d used that few seconds of leeway he said he had in time to stop you from doing it. You sigh, and fold your fingers through his, giving him big, disney princess eyes. He can’t resist that. He snorts out a laugh and leans over to kiss you, ignoring Frisk’s immediate protest. “well, if you don’t wanna spend hours throwing a spear at a snowman tonight - which i know is really really fun, so i don’t get it - what do you wanna do instead?” He asks playfully after a moment. 

“Can we go out somewhere?” You ask. “I’m going nuts just like… sitting in here, waiting for something to happen.” It’s been a frustrating few days, all things considered. Nothing good’s been happening at work, just hours of squinting at texts in that strange language that took hours to resolve into words, and even longer to make any sense out of those words. And then, home had basically been… well, dinner and then throwing spears around. It had been annoying to a bold new extreme, to be perfectly honest. Sans squints at that, then nods. 

“sure, babe. where d’ya wanna go?” 

“Anywhere. Movie, drinks, anything, can we just get out?” You beg, and his eyes widen, as he finally processes how much the past few days have been grating on you. 

“ah. crap. yeah, ‘course.” He says instantly. “soon as tori or undyne gets here to watch frisk, k?”

“Perfect.” You sigh, ignoring Frisk’s protest that they don’t need watching. This’ll be good. Going anywhere that isn’t here, EbbCo, or the backyard would be good. 

“somewhere nice?” Sans wants to know. You shake your head. 

“Heck no. Somewhere relaxed. I’d be happy to go to the supermarket, even.” You say, and he chuckles. 

“well, we can do better than that…”

\--------------------------------------------------------

It turns out you can’t do much better than that. The movie theater is downtown, and still closed after all the vandalism. The same goes for Grillby’s, to your dismay. You wrack your brains for a while, before Sans, very reluctantly, says the obvious solution;

“well, we could go to the bar capra took us to.” You squint skeptically at him

“He might not be there.” You finally rationalize, then roll your eyes. “I’m being ridiculous. He’s fine. You’re the one who’s been spending all day with him.” Sans grins and shrugs. 

“he could be worse.” He agrees with you, then laughs. “whatever. it’s monster friendly, and if capra’s there, we’ll put our stuff on his tab.” He smiles at Undyne, who’s now curled up with Frisk on her lap, watching Steven Universe and eating nice cream. Frisk had been being spoiled absolutely rotten these past few days, you think, grinning at them too. “you good with the kiddo?”

“Yeah, yeah. We’re all set.” Undyne assures you, not taking her eyes off the TV. “I’ll call if there’s any trouble. Have fun, stay out late, make bad choices and so on.” She drawls, giving you a vague wave. You chuckle at her, but then get her attention. 

“Seriously. Any sign of trouble, you call.” You hammer home. She sighs, then nods.

“How long d’you think we’re gonna have to live like this?” She murmurs under her breath, hugging Frisk a little tighter. 

You don’t know. 

\-------------------------------

When you step into The Cock and Bull with Sans, you both exchange grins. You’ve got a clear view of the bar, and Capra isn’t there, just a few humans you don’t recognize, and quite a few monsters (of course, no Grillby’s), quite a few of whom look very happy to see the two of you. You were finally starting to recognize a few of them; you give them all a cheerful wave back, and are just turning to smile at your boyfriend when you notice an awfully dishevelled looking businessman from the corner of your eye. He’s in a booth, by himself, slumped over a phone that he can’t be bothered to tear his eyes from, and a half empty glass of some amber liquor. 

“ah, damn it.” Sans has noticed Capra as well. “oh well. wanna say hi?” 

“Be rude if we didn’t.” You murmur, nudging him with his shoulder, and the two of you head over to his booth. “Hey, Capra. How’s it going?” He immediately looks up from his phone, and for a second, you catch an expression of deep concern on his face before he’s all gleaming smiles. 

“Guys! Buddies! Pals! And so on! Didn’t expect to see you here tonight!” He says brightly. Sans snorts. 

“didn’t expect to be here. you ok, bud?” He’s noticed that Capra isn’t quite himself too. 

“Yeah, yeah, it’s no big. Well, it’s kind of a big. Well, it’s big. Grab a seat.” Capra says rapidly, nodding across the table at the bench seat opposite him. You blink - jeez, Capra really is upset! and then slide down the bench. Sans does the same, settling in next to you and studying your boss. 

“must be pretty bad. not like you to... not text me telling me you’re going a place.” 

“Well you never come!” Capra gripes, then sighs, running his hand through his hair. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to snap. Just, uh… hey, Karl, drinks for my friends?” He grabs the human waiter’s attention, and you have to pause for a second to place your order, before he clears his throat and speaks up. 

“I don’t know if I’m just being paranoid. I don’t know what got me into it. But I looked at the employee records today, and… I’ve had seven monsters quit without giving their two weeks in the past month. Just an email saying they won’t be returning. Gloria quit today. Maybe.” He says, low and quiet. 

“...’s that a lot?” Sans says, suddenly paying Capra his full attention. 

“I’ve had two people quit on me the whole time I’ve been CEO before this.” Capra mutters. “Look. Tell me if this is just me being vain, but… EbbCo’s a good place for monsters to work, right? Honestly, be straight with me.” He seems so dejected, you both have to answer immediately, 

“‘course it is!” 

“Only place I feel safe knowing I won’t get harassed.” You admit, raising your arm pointedly. He smiles a little at that, then sighs. 

“Yeah. That’s what I thought. So. If that’s the case. Use your powers of deduction. If monsters don’t have a reason to quit, and I’m noticing this weird pattern-”

“they’re not really quitting.” Sans supplies instantly. “something’s happening to them.” Capra looks at him, his gaze intense and troubled. 

“All the monsters that quit… seems like they’re all more or less on their own. Not a lot of family, you get me?” He says, and drains the rest of his glass, nodding for another when Karl shows up with your beers. 

“Shit.” You mutter, suddenly feeling quite worried. “Peter…”

“I don’t know what to do.” He runs his hand through his hair again. “Everything’s normal on its face, but… I’ve got a really bad feeling. I don’t know what to do. I called the cops a few hours ago, once I convinced myself I wasn’t just seeing connections that weren’t there. They said they’d do some welfare checks, but you know how the cops in this town are when it comes to monsters…”

“capra. personal question.” Sans interjects suddenly. “why do you care so much when it seems like no other human gives a shit, unless it’s… well, like us. sorry, babe.” He adds, glancing at you. You give him a small smile, telling him you’re not offended. Capra takes a breath. 

“________, you remember me when I was in college right? Big nerd, right?” He asks. You nod quickly. 

“Huge nerd.” You confirm, and he gives you a toothy grin. 

“I wasn’t… I don’t know what I’m saying.” He rubs a weary, worried eye. “I guess I was on my own a lot back then, too. Definitely different. I mean, your mom and dad’s project, that was my _thing._ I grew up reading these fantasy books, all this sci-fi, and I just couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that there was magic, _real_ magic, and nobody even gave a shit about it other than it being some dusty old relic beyond our understanding except your parents. And then on the other side of the barrier, there were _people. _He says, clear and urgent. “Maybe a little different, but people. Like my books, my shows, whatever, like the aliens and elves and all that good shit, that we just had to meet and show kindness to, right? I mean, when I met your parents, they were the only people speaking my language, it felt like. They were the only people bothering to explore this. When they died, I had to learn a lot of lessons really fast. I wanted to keep their dream alive, and that meant making it look like I was someone who knew what he was doing.” He mutters. “People treat you how they see you. But, hey, people don’t really change, right? I was always pretty different. Why would I have a problem with monsters being pretty different too? We’re all just people.”__

__You think this over for a second, then Sans nods._ _

__“bud, tomorrow, i’m gonna take you to talk to the king, okay? he should know about this.” He mutters, and Capra’s eyes widen for a second, comprehending that this means going underground, going to the place that’s always been off limits._ _

__“Holy shit.” He mutters, grabbing his drink the second that it arrives and throwing half of it back. Sans grunts, and takes a sip of his beer as well._ _

__“i dunno if he’ll hear you, you know, but it’s worth saying.” He mutters, and Capra nods again. You’re staring at Capra, wondering if you’ve read him all wrong, when he looks to his left and suddenly all the color drains out of his face._ _

__“I am sorry in advance for this.” He says quickly, and you look over just in time to see a pretty young rabbit monster throw a glass of wine - it splatters all over Capra with alarming accuracy. At her side, a small blonde woman with a pixie cut smirks. Capra grimaces, wiping the wine off his face, and eyes the two of them._ _

__“Suppose I deserved that.” He mutters._ _

__“Yeah, well, next time you start to ‘have feelings that you don’t think you’ve had for anyone else ever before,’ maybe don’t use the exact same damn text to both girls you’re fooling around with!” The human drawls. “Go jump off a bridge, Peter.”_ _

__“A really tall one.” The rabbit agrees. “Hi Sans.”_ _

__“hey, kora.” Sans says, trying not to grin or laugh, you can hear it in his voice and you elbow him, digging into his ribs, before he earns the next glass of wine in his face. The two women look at Capra, dripping and miserable for a second, before turning scornfully away, walking together back to the bar._ _

__“Well, at least you’re an equal opportunity jerk.” You can’t keep from saying, after a few moments. Capra takes a deep breath, looking quite heartbroken. “Oh, jeez, Capra, are you -”_ _

__“This was a thousand dollar suit. Cheap red wine never comes out.” He says mournfully. “Excuse me.” He slides out of the bench to head for the men’s room to clean himself up, and you exchange a glance with Sans._ _

__“Poor guy.” You say after a moment._ _

__“...kinda.” Sans adds, finally snickering the way he’s clearly wanted to the entire time. But in his eyes, there’s a glint of worry that you can tell is probably reflected in your own expression. Something bad is happening, and neither of you have the slightest clue how to stop it._ _


	84. In Which Your Knowledge of Marine Biology Doesn't Take You To A Weird Place, Mentally

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't even know.   
> I love you guys. 
> 
> [Come hang out with me/witness me.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

When he returns from the bathroom, Capra stands next to Sans, looking forlorn. Sans glances up at him, arching a browbone. 

“‘samatter, bud?” 

“I just got wine dumped on me.” Capra sighs. 

“uh, yeah. saw that.” Sans drawls. Capra coughs, and then tries again. 

“It would be really nice if one of my friends who can goddamn teleport could take me back to my house so I could get a clean change of clothes.” He says slowly. You raise an eyebrow.

“Capra, having this magic is a huge responsibility. We don’t just use it for little things like that.” You hear yourself saying - oh, you know it’s not fair, but messing with Capra is ridiculously fun. Next to you, Sans takes a quick breath, and manages to compose his face to something appropriately stern and reproachful, his hand clutching yours tight under the table in absolute approval. Capra stares at the two of you, looking injured. 

“You’re kidding me. Guys. GUYS. _You used it to sneak away for a quickie on your first day of work._ ” You give him a spectacularly unimpressed look, but Sans is beginning to shake with silent laughter next to you, and eventually you give in and snicker too. Capra looks quite hurt, so you sigh, and nod at Sans. 

“Wouldn’t hurt to give him a lift.” You point out, and Capra perks up. Sans looks skeptical.

“how were you plannin’ on getting home, capra?” He demands. Capra blinks. 

“My car, obviously.” 

“after drinking?” Sans sounds like he’s scolding a child, which makes you snort. Capra rolls his eyes. 

“You’ve seen my car. There’s no damn steering wheel. Drives itself. Totally safe. It also has like, _really_ nice upholstery, which I don’t want to get covered in wine. I have no goddamn idea why I went with white leather. Sans. Pal. Guy. _______. Either of you. Guys.” He’s digging his heels in now, and the sad, vulnerable man of a few minutes ago is entirely gone, replaced with, well… Capra. Sans sighs, then nods. 

“k, c’mon, give me a map or something so i know what i’m aiming for.” He glances at you. “comin’ with?” He asks, releasing your hand. You consider this, then shake your head. 

“I’d better make sure they don’t think we’re skipping out on our tab. I’ll hang out. You have fun at Capra’s.” You grin, leaning in to kiss his cheek. He smiles at you, then looks more seriously at you.

“we’ll be right back. stay safe?” He murmurs, and you nod. 

“No picking fights, no stealing tips from the waitstaff, no improvised molotov cocktails. You’re no fun.” You tell him, poking out your bottom lip, and he laughs, sliding out of the booth and leaning over to kiss you properly. 

“see you in a few. capra, you got that map?” He asks, and Capra holds out his phone, peppering Sans with questions about how teleportation works as they walk out of the bar together. You sigh, and pull out your own phone, looking to see if anything’s new. You’re feeling troubled by Capra’s concern for his missing employees, and you can’t keep from thinking that this isn’t the first time you’ve heard about monsters up and vanishing. This wasn’t a good sign. Goddamn it, something really uncool was happening in your town, and you didn’t know the first thing to do about it.

You’re sitting there, feeling tense and nursing your beer, when a hand falls on your shoulder unexpectedly. Everything that’s happened in the past few weeks comes to you in a rush, a sudden panicked lurch, and before you know it, you’re out of the booth, on your feet, and all you can see is the sputtering green soul of your assailant as you whirl - your spear forming in your hand - before your vision clears and you realize, with a lurch of embarrassment, that it’s just Tommy and Aaron. 

“Hey. Hey. It’s cool.” To your surprise, Aaron addresses you softly. “You’re good. You’re safe.” He looks a little tense, and Tommy looks a little pale, but they’re both doing their best to give you reassuring looks. Your mind lurches inexorably to what seems like forever ago, way back at the aquarium, at the beginning, before Sans had moved in, before all of this, when Undyne had been startled by a parrot and had instantly dropped into the same instinctive, defensive crouch. 

“Oh, god… sorry guys.” You whisper, breathing out slowly. The sensation of bone clutched in your hand fades away to nothing, and you close your eyes, trying to focus. 

“It’s cool. I guess we really shouldn’t be sneaking up on anyone, anymore, huh?” Tommy says quietly. You force your eyes back open, and see that he’s giving you a sweet, adorably crooked smile.

“Heh. Yeah. Guess not.” You murmur, running your hand anxiously through your hair. You can feel the eyes of half the bar on you right now, and you’re feeling hideously embarrassed for making such a scene. Tommy doesn’t care. When he sees that you’re no longer liable to lash out, he takes a step closer, cautiously, and then gives you a warm hug that you don’t entirely expect - you react clumsily, only barely touching his back before he pulls away. “I saw you out there, the other night.” You tell him quietly. “Just through a camera-”

“You were with our kids.” Aaron interjects, perhaps sensing that you’re about to downplay your importance on that night. Unwillingly, your eyes dart between the two of them, trying to parse the meaning of ‘our kids,’ before Aaron whinnies out a laugh and says, “Uh, the monsters’ kids, I mean.” Tommy, suddenly understanding your confusion, blushes almost as red as his hair. 

“Haha, yeah, I was. It turned out to be a pretty safe and easy job though, all things considered.” You admit, though you can’t stop your mind from darting to your knowledge of marine biology, that male seahorses carried the young - oh, stop it, you were being ridiculous, stop imagining Aaron pregnant right this instant you weirdo! “You guys want to join us? I promise I’m not drinking alone, Sans and Capra will be right back.” You offer, forcing your mind back on track. Aaron grins, pulling up a chair - his tail won’t fit in the booth, and Tommy smiles and nods.

“Capra. That’s the guy who organized all the clean up stuff, right?” Tommy asks, sliding in on the seat opposite you. You nod, and then glance up as you hear Sans and Capra coming back through the door, bickering. 

“Speak of the devil.” You sigh, and stand up, introducing Capra to Aaron and Tommy. Capra puts on his most charming face, shaking hands and giving wide smiles to your friends. He gets along with them well, of course. Capra can get along well with anyone if he sets his mind to it, and he even gets the hint to not flirt so much with Aaron when Tommy looks a little put out. Capra was more socially astute than you gave him credit for. Maybe. 

By the time you’re all ready to call it a night, it seems like Capra’s won over two new friends, and you’re just ready to snuggle up with your boyfriend and get some sleep. The man is charming, you’ll give him that. Maybe he’ll even be charming enough to win over Asgore tomorrow. 

\----------------------------------- 

Sans leaves pretty early the next morning to take Capra to talk to the king. “sure you don’t wanna come?” He asks, and you wrinkle your nose, burrowing back into your pillow. 

“Mmmm, when the last time went so well?” You say sarcastically. He snickers, and you sigh. “Go on without me. I told Undyne I’d do Maid of Honor stuff today. And, you know, hang out with Frisk and Spot.” 

“and maybe get a little practice in?” Sans offers. You squint up at him, and then roll your eyes as dramatically as you can. 

“Nag more.” You suggest sarcastically, and he snickers again. “Babe, I feel like I almost stuck a spear straight through Tommy last night. Maybe I’m just not good at throwing weapons at snowmen?” You’d told him all about the “incident,” of course, and he’d been awfully understanding about it - you should have expected that the backlash would happen at some point. He tilts his skull, considering this, then laughs and leans down to give you a slow, not entirely fair kiss.

“maybe.” He offers, and gives you a toothy grin. “glad you didn’t skewer tommy. he’s nice.” 

“He is.” You yawn, snuggling back up into your blankets. “Go have fun with Capra.”

“you’re hilarious.” He drawls, gives the top of your head one last kiss, and then winks out of sight, presumably to Capra’s house. You sigh and close your eyes, hoping for a few more hours of -

WUMPH. 

The door bangs against the armoire in the doorframe, and you hear Undyne let out a startled yelp. Oh, god, you have _got_ to get a lock, this is ridiculous! 

“_________? Why is there something in front of the door?” She calls.

“Because you maniacs keep barging in!” You groan, shoving yourself out of bed and grumpily getting dressed. “What if I was doing something not meant for your eyes? Also, dude, naked!?” 

“...Oh. Yeah. Guess that makes sense.” Undyne says. “Well, hurry up, we’ve got planning to do!”

“I’m hurrying, I’m hurrying, two seconds.” You grumble, yanking a shirt on and then walking over to the armoire, shoving it out of the way with your shoulder. You were really scuffing up the hardwood with this shit, you notice. Okay. Lock. You’re getting a lock, it’s on the list. “Okay. What’s the big-” You cut yourself off as the door swings open, revealing Undyne and an absolutely enormous, frilly white binder you’ve never seen before, labeled in Undyne’s chicken scratch handwriting, “Wedding Crap.” 

“WEDDING CRAP!” She yells exultantly, grabbing your hand and tugging you down the hall. “C’mon, Mettaton’s already here, we’ve got a lot to get done!

\--------------------------------------

You’d never realized how many things went into a wedding; by the time you’re halfway done with this planning session, you’re considering begging Sans to elope. Well, if he actually did propose. And, well, if you were allowed to marry him in the first place, it still wasn’t clear if that was precisely legal where you were. 

“And Frisk, you want to be the flower-kid?” Undyne’s asking. 

“ **NO.** ” Frisk’s answer is immediate and vehement. You blink at them. 

“You sure, pal? All you have to do is walk down the aisle and drop some petal-”

“ **No way.** ” Frisk crosses their arms stubbornly. You, Mettaton and Undyne exchange a glance around the dining table, where you’ve got all the wedding stuff spread out. 

“Okay then.” Undyne mutters. “Ringbearer?” Frisk perks up immediately and nods. Undyne’s brow furrows, but she sticks out the tip of her tongue, carefully scrawling “Frisk, ringbearer” on a detailed spreadsheet that must have been made by Alphys - it’s too tidy to be Undyne’s. Mettaton immediately begins sketching out an outfit for Frisk on a pad of blank paper, and you yawn, reaching for your coffee and waiting for a bit where you could be helpful. 

Lesser Dog lets out a volley of barks from wherever he’s playing with Papyrus outside, and the four of you tense up for a second - you can’t miss it - but almost immediately relax when you hear the sound of the front door swinging open, and the low rumble of Sans’ voice. 

“In here!” You call out, and a moment or two later, Sans and, to your mild surprise, Capra come walking in. After the initial round of greetings, you interject, “Well, how did it go?” Capra makes a face, and Sans mutters, 

“not, uh, great.” 

“Not exactly bad, either.” Capra sighs. 

“yeah. um. he thanked us for bringing it to his attention.”

“He said he’d take it under advisement.” Capra echoes. “And that he’s close to closing a deal with the human government.” 

“so maybe later we can get a crack at trying to scale up the core magic for the township.” Sans says, rubbing an eye. 

“But right now we have to wait.” Capra concludes. “On everything.” Looking at the two of them, you almost have to smile. They both, obviously, hate waiting. It sounded like the news really hadn’t been that bad. Asgore hadn’t thrown them out or anything. But for them, being stuck in a holding pattern was utterly miserable. 

“anyway, figured you guys had something going for lunch.” Sans says, then grins, “an’ since this idiot literally doesn’t have any food in his house - seriously, babe, you should have seen the place-”

“Hey. My house is _sweet._ ” Capra interjects. 

“it’s like, ninety-three percent mirrors, you vain …” Sans trails off, glancing at Frisk and deciding not to finish that sentence. “and you literally don’t have food. how do you live?” 

“I’ve always depended on the kindness of strangers.” Capra drawls, batting his eyelashes at Sans. Mettaton clears his throat, a wide smile on his face.

“Well, darling, we’d be pleased to invite you for lunch. I’m afraid I don’t live here, so I don’t have any control over the quality of the ingredients in the fridge, but I can assure you that there’s an _exquisite_ wine cellar.” He purrs. Capra arches an eyebrow, smiling, and you turn your head slowly to glare at Mettaton. 

“Oh, by all means, help yourself to my food and drink.” You drawl. 

“Thank you, precious!” Mettaton deliberately misses your sarcasm. “Peter, if you’re at all interested, we’ll pick out a vintage that might interest you.” Capra grins and inclines his head in a nod, and you do your very best not to say anything unkind. “Right this way, then, darling, I’ll whip something up for all of us, you know, I _have_ appeared on several cooking shows.” 

“Well, I’m sure you’re very talented…” Capra follows Mettaton out towards your kitchen (and wine cellar), but not before turning and giving the rest of you a wolfish grin that bodes terribly. 

“we should stop this.” Sans mutters. Undyne begins to snicker. 

“Please, don’t. This is going to be hilarious.” She hisses, trying to keep her voice low.

“What?” You interject, and she gives you her widest, pointiest grin. 

“Two egos like that? They’ll be at each other’s throats before lunch is over.” She assures you. Sans, thinking this over, begins to chuckle quietly, collapsing in the seat next to yours and taking your hand. You bite your lip and decide, fine, this is fine. You can have Capra wandering around your house and flirting with your robot friend. 

What’s the worst that could happen?


	85. In Which The Whole Chapter Is Capraton Stuff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Things are certainly starting to come to a boil in ol' CoBC world, huh!? Wonder what will happen next!  
> (I mean, I know, but still!) 
> 
> Here's your reminder to come check out my Tumblr, where you can see great fanart, in-character asks, support a literally starving writer *cough*, and oh, geez, all sorts of other great stuff!
> 
> Great!
> 
> Oh, but let me plug [this Capra fan mix](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/143046625401/were-saving-the-world-baby) that [blue-stop-signs](http://blue-stop-signs.tumblr.com) made as well because it's fucking perfect in every way.

“I’m going in the kitchen.” You insist. Sans shakes his head. 

“just… let it happen.” He says lazily. He’s dragged you and Undyne away from the wedding planning into the family room and called L.D. and Papyrus inside, a small (shiteating) smile on his face as he settles back to… well, witness whatever comes next. 

“I feel like they need a chaperone.” You sigh. Undyne nods, an evil grin on her face. 

“Fuhuhu, yeah, what if they decide to - you know - in the kitchen?” She says, laughing. “I mean, you do know, right?” She looks at all of you expectantly, wiggling her eyebrows. 

“UNDYNE! PLEASE DON’T BE DISGUSTING, THAT’S MY FAVORITE ROOM!” Papyrus begs, looking horrified. Apparently, Papyrus is not immune to innuendo.

You and Sans do not make eye contact. 

There’s the sound of a clatter - is that a pan or your kitchen falling apart? You’re half out of your chair before Sans grabs your wrist, easing you back down into your seat. 

“it’ll be fine.” He assures you again, and you groan, closing your eyes. 

“Okay. Okay.” You exhale. It’s just Mettaton and Capra in your kitchen. They’re probably not doing anything awful, right? Right?

Just then, Capra comes stalking back into the family room, an extremely irritated look on his face. Without saying a word, he flops down in the large recliner, and rubs his temples with one hand. Sans squints at him. 

“that was fast.” He notes. Capra snorts, running a hand through his hair and displacing several pieces from his immaculate coif so they fall across his forehead. You note, with some displeasure, that he’s pulling that look off. 

“The guy kept trying to teach me stuff!” He says indignantly. “Me!” 

“Uh, what stuff?” You ask quickly, half prepared to be horrified by the answer. 

“How to make food.” Capra scoffs. You stare at him. He raises an eyebrow back at you, looking perfectly comfortable perched in your dad’s favorite leather recliner in his thousand dollar suit. 

“Uh… well, _do_ you know how to make food?” You finally ask. 

“Immaterial.” Capra says with a shrug. Sans rolls his eyes next to you, and Undyne sighs. 

“Man. I thought it was gonna be funnier.” She says in an undertone. 

“give it time.” Sans insists. 

“What?” Capra demands, and Sans nods at the TV. 

“the, uh, show.” He lies, not even putting any work into sounding convincing. Which, to be fair, would have been a challenge, since you’re watching the news, not a comedy. Capra stares hard at him for a few moments, then leans back in the chair and sighs. 

“Anyway, he kicked me out here until lunch is ready. How do you guys do this stuff? I’ve got this app on my phone, I press a button, boom - fifteen minutes later, there it is, sandwich. Pastrami for days. You guys are living in the past.” He drawls, then looks at you. You shrug. 

“I feel like this is a good experience for you. Instead of delivery, you have… a robot… monster… cook for… you know what, I feel like this isn’t actually a good experience for you. You should learn to cook.” You laugh, shaking your head. Sans snickers. “Anyway. If we’re waiting for Mettaton to make something, it’s probably gonna be a while. He makes fancy food. Like, he once beat Gordon Ramsay in a cookoff.” You say with a small shrug. “So, uh, tell me - how’d your first trip underground go?” Capra opens his mouth, then glances at Undyne, Papyrus and Sans, slowly considering what he’s going to say. 

“The palace was very nice.” He finally decides. 

“that’s noncommittal.” Sans notes dryly. “go on, you can say it-”

“I thought it would be different! Magic and shit!” Capra moans tragically. “It was just… I mean, it wasn’t even really underground! It was all open to the sky and stuff, and nobody was doing anything weird. It was just nice flowers-”

“THANK YOU!” Papyrus beams, and you chuckle, remembering that tending to the gardens is basically his entire job. 

“-oh, are those yours? Well, good job, bud.” Capra says with a laugh. Sans, who has been watching Capra closely from the second that Papyrus interrupted, relaxes, looking somewhat pleased with your boss for taking his brother in stride. “But… I dunno. I just thought it would be, I dunno, different.” 

You bite your lip, thinking about that. You’d probably have had the same line of thought if you hadn’t stepped into the palace during the winter festival, that first time. But… there was a feeling of magic in the Underground, you’d noticed that, particularly when you were in deep, at Sans’ old house. Then again, maybe that was just him, maybe it was just the sense of feeling like you were discovering something new about him, even if it was something not so great, like the confirmation that he’d been miserable while living in Snowdin. Capra’s still going off about what he’d expected - something about… drow? you didn’t know what that was - but Sans looks over at you and notices you’re a million miles away. 

“hey. you alright?” He inquires, and you nod quickly. 

“Yeah. Just thinking about your home in Snowdin. It was nice.” You murmur, scooting a little to the right so you can feel him, warm, next to you. He looks at you for a moment, then nods. 

“it was good for us. while we were stuck down there. but this is home now, with you.” He says, so resolute on this matter that it makes your heart stutter. 

“Are you even paying attention?” Capra demands. Sans snorts. 

“yeah, yeah, mystical caverns, mines of moria. i told you that wasn’t how it was gonna be.” He dismisses, then calls out, loud enough to carry into the kitchen, “hey, mettaton? what time are we looking at for lunch?”

“Don’t rush me, darling - oh, hello Frisk. Yes, _you_ certainly can help.” Mettaton sounds perturbed, and he’s still speaking loudly enough to carry into the room, so you know that he means Capra to have heard it. Capra rolls his eyes, looking the tiniest bit remorseful. You, on the other hand, feel a little relieved. Frisk and Mettaton are fine in the kitchen, so those two will keep each other out of trouble, probably. Probably. You’re just thinking that your concerns are over when you practically feel Sans’ stare on you. Oh, goddamn it. 

“you know, if we’ve got some time to kill…” He begins, sounding very innocent. 

“Bow-chicka-wow-wow.” Undyne interjects, grinning. Sans turns to give her a withering glare, then looks back at you, as Capra smirks at the whole scene. 

“i was gonna say. you could, uh, get some practice-”

“Fine.” You sigh, standing up. “Lemme get my coat. Try to kill some more damn snowmen.” 

\----------------------------------

Capra insists on joining you, of course, which, for once, you’re totally fine with. The alternative is that he continues to hang out in the house with Mettaton, and that seems dangerous and bad. With a sigh, you lead the way outside, your small retinue trailing behind you like ducklings. 

“Hey, I’m letting out Spot.” You warn, once you’re in the backyard. “Capra, you might wanna hang back… just in case.”

“Spot? She loves me. I’m fine.” He insists, but he doesn’t get any closer, you notice, as you slice the hole into reality and set her free from the void. She’s waiting there for you, as usual, and gives you the expected enthusiastic greeting, almost bowling you over. 

“Good girl.” You coo, scratching under her massive jaw, then watch her fall still for a second as she catches some unfamiliar… scent? Soul? Something? You’re not sure how Spot works. She relaxes, however, when she realizes that it’s Capra, who’s fed her a grilled cheese sandwich and is therefore okay in her book. After a few more minutes of nuzzling, she hovers slowly over to Undyne, Sans, Papyrus and Capra to greet them cursorily. This means, of course, that there’s no more distractions. With a sigh, you turn and square off against a drooping snowman, around twenty feet away. You’d asked Sans if it was really necessary for you to be that far, and he’d said, with a shrug, that he knew that you could throw it that far if you chose to. Hmph. 

“ _What’s she doing?_ ” Capra thinks he’s whispering. 

“That nerd can make a spear, just like me. Well, kinda like me. Because, you know, I can throw it like fifty feet, and she-”

“Undyne.” You growl, concentrating. You’ve done this enough that the jagged shaft of bone falls easily enough out of nothing into your hand. 

“Holy shit.” Capra has forgotten to be quiet. “That’s…”

“yeah.” You don’t need to turn your face to know that your boyfriend has a smug, pleased grin on his face. Well, that wouldn’t stick around for long. With a feeling of resignation, you hoist the spear up in your right hand, focus on the soul - well, “soul,” by this point it was just a rotting tomato jammed into the center of something that could barely be called a snowman - anyway, you try to focus on the soul in front of you, and you throw - 

Phlumph. The spear buries itself, anticlimactically, about fifteen feet in front of you. It quivers there, tip first in the snow and dirt, before it fades to nothing. 

“Hey, that one was pretty good!” Undyne calls out. 

“YES! YOU DID MUCH BETTER THAN THE LAST TIME!” Papyrus chimes in. 

“Hey, maybe I can help. You know, I did track and field in high school, I used to watch the javelin throwers practice…” Capra offers. You turn to look at him. 

“You did track and field?”

“I’m a man of many mysteries. And you’ve got to try a running start.” He insists. “Use your momentum.” You think about this, biting your lip. 

“makes sense.” Sans chimes in after a moment. “maybe it would help…”

And so that’s what you do. Five, ten, fifteen times in a row, until your arm is sore and you’re tired of pulling spears out of thin air, and you’ve gained maybe two feet of distance in your throws. Capra is watching you like a hawk, and you’re willing to believe he actually _did_ do track and field from the feedback he’s giving you:

“Why are you twisting your hips like that?” He calls out, then,

“Damn it, you can’t slow down before you hit your mark!” Oh, god, he would be SUCH an awful dad at his kid’s little league game. Well. He would be such an awful dad, period. He goes on and on, and Sans doesn’t shut him up, because, well, he’s clearly had one good idea, by the end your spear is quivering at the base of the snowman, but it’s grating! Damn it! 

“_______, come on, I told you, you’ve got to keep your head up, or-”

“DAMN IT, Capra!” You bellow, whirling to look at him, halfway through your running start, and - 

And once again, something clicks. 

The world dims, slows, and all you can see is four souls, hovering against the blackness of… of time? Of…

There’s Papyrus, crackling a soft blue, the teal of Undyne’s soul, the unmistakable blue flare that is Sans, and that metallic, reflective purple, and no, no, it’s not just souls in this instant of time, there’s Spot hovering there, behind Capra’s reflective heart, she’s looking at you quizzically, waiting for the word and then -

You wrench your head to the side, and the world bursts back in around you as you shudder to a halt, breathing hard. 

“What was that-” Capra’s demanding, but Sans holds a hand out in front of him, the lights of his eyes bright. 

“you got it.” He says, so quiet you can barely hear it. “just like that. reach out for the dummy.” Your head still buzzing, you turn to the snowman again, and this time, focusing on that squashed tomato “soul,” you get it. You find your focus in the maelstrom of thoughts whirling around your head, you take your magic, gather it up from your soul and the world dims again, and - it’s just you and your target, and you barely need to move your arm, because it’s not your muscles, sending this weapon off. You understand what you’ve been doing wrong this whole time now. You’ve been throwing with your arm, hoping the strength of the skeletal component would give you the few additional feet you needed, but this is a magic spear, and you need to _push_ with your magic, pulling it from the air was just step one, you need to -

Thunk. 

Your spear - or perhaps Capra was right, maybe it really was a javelin - buries itself in the center of that rotting tomato, but you’re already moving, pulling another spear out of the air, looking at the next snowman - 

Thunk. 

Again. 

Thunk. 

Thunk. 

Thunk. 

It repeats so naturally.

The last snowman, perhaps ninety feet away, that’s too far, and you lose your focus, the perfect stillness ends and you come back to yourself, the blackness of everything but you and the “souls” fading and the winter sunlight filtering back in. 

Nine snowmen are in various states of disaster. The one closest to you has practically evaporated - there’s just an icy chunk at the base that was once feet. You turn slowly to look at your friends, unsure of what to say. Undyne, Papyrus, and (especially) Capra look like they’re in shock. Capra’s jaw is hanging open, and he looks a shade paler than usual.

“Never seen anyone move that fast.” He’s muttering. 

Sans is grinning, practically dripping with silent pride. 

\----------------------------------------------------

The good news is that it seems like practice is now over. Sans walks over to begin quizzing you about what had just happened, and he has you drop, three times, into that state of focus - he seems to know when you’re tapping into it even when Undyne and Papyrus can’t tell, which you don’t know if that’s a Sans thing, or a ‘knowing your soul’ thing, or a mixture of the two. 

“I know how to do it now, trust me.” You say with a crooked smile, and he grins at you, looking relieved. 

“yeah you do.” He murmurs, and leans in to kiss you softly. You can feel his relief, now, and you almost feel bad, realizing just how worried he’d been that you’d been defenseless before. Well… “defenseless.” There was always still Spot, who was currently cozied up to Capra and rumbling with a sound halfway between a growl and a purr - Capra was petting her enthusiastically, but you could feel his gaze on you at odd moments when you weren’t looking right at him. You got the sense that questions were coming, and you doubted he’d cope well when you revealed that you just couldn’t answer them. 

“Darlings, lunch is served!” Mettaton’s voice cuts through the reserved, quiet chatter of your friends, and you look up to see him standing framed in the kitchen’s sliding glass door, wearing your mother’s apron and looking slightly confused. “Oh… my. _______, did you do all that?” He says, gazing out upon the destruction in the back yard. You wince, and incline your head slightly. Mettaton thinks on this for a moment, then sighs. “It’s a waste, you know, that you don’t want to be on television. You and I could make a killing.” He grumbles, but then perks up. “Well, anyway, I’m glad to see that you’ll be able to show any nasty humans a piece of your mind if they try to hurt you!” He says brightly. 

“...She certainly will.” Capra mutters, looking up from Spot and locking eyes with you for a second, his expression unreadable. Then he turns, gives Mettaton an apologetic smile, and begins thanking him effusively for getting lunch together. As you watch Mettaton slowly melt under the onslaught of Capra’s charm, you have to think again what a strange friendship you’ve fallen into with this man. If it is, indeed, a friendship. 

Sometimes, it’s pretty hard to tell.


	86. In Which You Have A Nice Evening In With Some Thai Food

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [You know where to go.](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

Watching Capra work his way back into Mettaton’s good graces over duck a l’orange, gruyere souffle and candied fennel salad (“with a playful Gewürtztraminer I found in the cellars, darling”) is nothing short of fascinating. Mettaton’s resistant, at first, but Capra ramps up the charm, asking about cooking techniques and apologizing for his earlier behavior - you discover their earlier tiff had been about Capra’s utter refusal to separate an egg, since he deemed touching a raw egg to be ‘disgusting’ and ‘for, like, other people to do.’ Mettaton eventually gives in, giving Capra a genuine smile that’s almost cute, if it weren’t for the self-satisfied look in Capra’s eyes when Mettaton glances away. 

Oh, well. Fuck. What are you going to do, tell him not to look so happy? Tell him he’s not allowed to flirt with the robot? Frisk is eying him dubiously… and also eyeing, well, everything dubiously - Frisk is very much a mac and cheez kid, and the plate’s a little daunting for them. After a second, they tug on your sleeve to get your attention and begin to sign, 

**”If you’re done with the magic stuff outside, can we finally watch Return of the Jedi?”** They beg. **”Mom doesn’t have it so I can only watch it here!”**

“Oh, yeah, sure-” You’re beginning, when you’re suddenly cut off. 

“Kid. You haven’t seen Jedi?!” Capra demands. Frisk squints at him. 

**”Why do you know how to sign?** They demand suddenly. Capra shrugs. 

“Had a deaf roommate in boarding school.” He signs along as he speaks, though you notice that he’s clearly forming his words so Frisk can read them as well. “He was a cool guy. I’m a little uh…” He hesitates for a second, then spells out, “r-u-s-t-y.” Frisk grins at this and nods, and Capra continues, single minded. “You haven’t seen Jedi though?” He demands once more, then turns to stare at you. “Have I taught you _nothing_?” He asks, withering, then nods at Frisk. “Come on, kid. Finish your food so we can fix this.” Frisk thinks about this for a second, then dives into their souffle. 

To Mettaton’s chagrin, Capra pays very little attention to him for the rest of the day (and he does stick around, more or less uninvited, for the rest of the day). On the other hand, once Frisk breaks out their action figures, you suspect that Capra might have made a friend for life. 

\----------------------------------

You realize in retrospect that you’d been saving that day - the day you finally figured your attack out - in your head like it was a precious memory, something to hang onto when everything goes to hell in a handbasket. Just a nice day with your friends, a day where nothing bad had happened, which seemed rare enough. But then, well… those days just keep coming. You’re braced for the other shoe to fall, but it _doesn’t._ And little by little, everyone begins to relax. A week crawls by, then another. You no longer jump when someone startles you. Undyne stops waking up at two in the morning to pace the perimeter of the house. Sans… well, Sans still seems tired most of the time, but you’ve determined that this is just normal sleepy-Sans, not “I stayed up all night after you went to bed because I thought someone was going to firebomb the house” Sans. 

And yet - you all have this conversation with each other, relatively frequently… it just seems wrong to let your guard down. It seems like that’s exactly what they - whoever “they” are - would want, why they’re giving you this period of respite where no monsters are vanishing, no homes are trashed. You still can’t quite convince yourself that everything’s over, that the attack on Toriel’s house was the end of it. 

Sans tells you that in your sleep, your hand sometimes clenches for a spear that isn’t there. 

When you finally receive the text, a single word “shit.” from Sans in the middle of a workday, you’re honestly relieved. Something’s happening. Finally, you can expend this nervous energy that’s been coiling inside you. 

“What’s wrong, babe?” You text back at once, your heart hammering. 

“our reservation cancelled on us.” He replies after a moment. “i’m so sorry.” 

You blink at your phone. 

“Wait, sorry, I’m not following. What?” You type, absently closing the dusty book in front of you and staring at the screen. 

“um. you know. i asked you a few weeks ago what your favorite place to eat was that wasn’t grillby’s and you said it was the tide pool?” He types, after a minute. You blink at the screen. “anyway they cancelled. called up just now. asked if i was a monster. said they were so sorry but they’d gotten threats and they wanted to make sure everyone who ate there was safe. so, uh. no reservation.” He sends. You try to parse this for a long moment, then give up. 

“Sans, what? Why do we need a reservation for dinner?” 

“babe. look at your calendar.” He sends back. You glance at the date and time on your phone for a second, before it clicks. 

“Oh my god. I am so sorry. Happy Valentine’s Day?” You type out weakly, suddenly feeling wretched. You’d forgotten, and he, clearly, had remembered. “Oh my god, Sans. I am really so sorry. I can’t believe I didn’t think about it.” You rapidly add. “Oh no. I am actually the worst. I didn’t even get you a present.” You send that before you can think if it’s really wise, and then immediately start drafting an apology to tell him that it doesn’t at all reflect how important he is to you, when he steps neatly into your office.

“please stop apologizing.” He begs, and leans down to kiss you softly. “i just… i know this is a big day for humans, i didn’t want to mess it up…” He offers, and you groan.

“I’m so so-” He levels a playful glare at you, and you shake your head. “I just, you know, I’ve never actually _done_ Valentine’s. And, you know, it’s not a big deal. For me, anyway. We don’t need to go out or anything. I’m happy just hanging out with you.” You’re telling the truth. He watches you for a second, warily, then groans, shaking his head. 

“watched too many sitcoms. i thought you were gonna be so mad at me for losing our-” You burst out laughing at that. 

“Does that really sound like me?” You insist, and he gives you a sheepish grin, shaking his head. 

“nah.” 

“And besides, it sounds like you didn’t lose our reservation, it sounds like The Tide Pool is staffed with … _assholes!_ ” You hiss, your indignation finally rising in you now that the confusion has faded. “What the hell, they’re gonna kick every monster out so that the humans can feel more comfortable?” You say, and he gives you a crooked smile.

“or, uh, safer. guess some of the local places have been getting threats for serving monsters.” He mutters. You grit your teeth. 

“Well, that’s stupid. They should be braver.” 

“not everyone’s like you, babe.” He says, sounding tired. You sigh, standing up and wrapping your arms around him. 

“I’m so sorry, Sans.” You murmur again. “You were so sweet to do all this. What do you want to do tonight, baby? Let’s do something you like.” He shrugs a little, and you blink. “Oh! Isn’t the grand re-opening of Grillby’s tonight? Let’s go there!” You say happily. He stares at you. 

“but i always take you to grillby’s.” He mutters. “kinda wanted tonight to be special.” You make a face at him. 

“It’s your favorite place - and mine too. I bet a ton of our friends will be there. It’ll be safe. And we’ll get to celebrate humans and monsters working together to fix it up. That’s special, isn’t it?” You ask, and he finally gives you a wide smile. 

“‘k, i’m sold, we’ll go to my favorite restaurant and eat burgers and fries on the special human love day.” He says sarcastically, grinning. “you make my life way too easy, you know that?” 

“That’s the idea.” You murmur, kissing his browbone softly. 

\----------------------------------

He beams at you when you come downstairs that night, dressed to go out. 

“that dress.” He says, and you grin. 

“Oh, this old thing?” It’s the same one you’d worn on your very first date to Grillby’s, and it isn’t lost on him. He’s not at all dressed up - he’s just got his black t-shirt and baggy jeans and sneakers on, but that makes you grin, because it’s right for him. He smiles brightly at you and says, 

“got everything?” You beam at him. 

“Almost.” You say, and lean in to kiss him as sweetly as you can. “There. Now we can go.” 

“you’re so cute it’s not even fair, sometimes.” He mutters, his cheeks the faintest shade of blue, and leans around you to grab his hoodie from the couch where he’s left it. You grin at him. 

“I do my best.” You say with a lazy shrug, and he takes your hand, cutting a door into the alley behind Grillbys. 

You turn the corner, onto the street, to find a handful of protesters, holding signs (the now familiar “BACK WHERE THEY BELONG”). Sans falters slightly, seeing them, then grunts, gritting his teeth and clutching the bones of your hand tightly as you walk past them. The chanting starts up immediately - “BACK WHERE YOU BELONG, BACK WHERE YOU BELONG”- and you feel the tension, the full body awareness crackle over you. Unconsciously, you’re flexing the fingers of your free hand, thinking - you could form a spear in your flesh-and-blood hand too, you’d discovered, it was just a tiny bit harder-

“It’s the freak with the arm!” One of them yells out, and instantly, the intensity of the group of protesters doubles. 

“Filthy-”

“Slut-”

“Thou shall not-” 

“Traitor!” 

Sans is holding your hand very tightly indeed now, and you turn to make sure that he understands that you’re okay. 

“Ignore them.” You murmur. His eye is crackling blue, a sure sign he’s about to snap, but he meets your gaze and exhales, then pointedly raises his middle finger at the protesters before escorting you the rest of the way into Grillby’s. 

“Mm, nice.” You tell him with a soft chuckle once you’re inside. He gives you a pained look. 

“i really didn’t want that to-” 

“I know.” You sigh, and squeeze his hand. “Not your fault. Besides.” You glance around the bar. “They clearly didn’t keep anyone else from coming out here, either.” 

Grillby’s is packed to the gills with monsters and humans alike. As you step out of the path of the doors, quite a few voices call out in greeting to the both of you. You grin, noticing not just the many monsters you’d befriended over the past few months, but also more than a few of your fellow volunteers, who’d helped put Grillby’s back in order and were now making sure that it stayed in business. Grillby waves at you from behind the bar - you wave back eagerly - and then nods his head at the corner booth, which is unoccupied in spite of the number of people who are there. 

“You still got us a reservation!” You laugh, beaming at Sans. He shrugs, looking sly. 

“least i could do.” His spirit seems to be lifted by the warm welcome the two of you have gotten, and he looks cheerful enough as you make your way through the crowd. It takes a while - there’s so many people to greet - but at last you’re at your table, and the knot of anxious energy in your chest has unwound once more as you glance over the menu, your hand in his still, and begin to thoroughly enjoy your first Valentine’s date. 

\----------------------------------------

If you linger there for too long, nobody really seems to mind. Sans makes excellent company, and you, well, you’re just too busy laughing with him, feeling relieved that the evening really does seem to be going okay, to even be upset about the protesters. It’s not until it’s time to leave that the subject even comes up again - it’s getting late, and the two of you do, technically, have work in the morning. 

“we could just leave from in here.” Sans points out, and you sigh. 

“I don’t like doing it in front of so many people. It just seems…” You pause, then raise your arm pointedly. “Unsafe.” 

“yeah. ok.” Sans sighs, looking glum. You look at him, and reach up to rub his back. 

“I’m sorry, babe. I promise, I still had an amazing night, even if humans decided to be assholes tonight.”

“no.” He interjects. You blink at him, confused once again. “not humans. just… some people.” He says, after a moment. “humans are great. or, uh, they sure can be. look around. look at all these people who came out here tonight.” He says quietly. “it’s not a human thing, it’s just an… asshole thing, you know?” You give him a smile, shrugging. 

“Yeah, sure. I mean, you don’t need to worry, Sans, I’m not offended-”

“no, no, but i’ve been, uh, thinkin’ about this.” He says quietly. “for a while now. and, uh… i fell in love with a human.” 

“Well, sure, but Capra’s not here to hear this so you don’t need to be sweet on his behalf.” You tease, and he snorts out an undignified laugh before mock-glaring at you. 

“nah. c’mon, i’m actually trying to be serious here.” He attempts, and you chuckle and nod, holding up your hands in surrender. “i love you. and you’re a human. so, humans are… perfect.” He says softly, looking at you. “they’re just people. some of ‘em make mistakes. just like monsters. you, uh… you get rid of all the surface stuff, the skin and the hair and the magic and whatever, and we’re all just the same.” He murmurs, and you realize his mind is elsewhere, as you begin to recognize how familiar this sentiment is.

“...Were you _spying on me?_ When I was feeding the penguins, way back?!” You demand, and he gives you an absolutely enormous grin. 

“got frisk to read lips. you mad?” 

“Not at all you sweet… idiot, oh my god, I can’t believe you got an eight year old to spy on me!” You laugh weakly, leaning against him. “Oh man, you had it baaaaaad for me, huh?!” 

“ha, hey, i wasn’t the one blushin’ the second she saw me in the crowd!” He teases back, elbowing your ribs. “but… yeah. always will.” He chuckles, then swallows, his expression clouding over. He’s thinking hard about something. “heh. oh god. uh. i think this is happening.” He finally mutters. 

Once again, you are thoroughly confused. 

“yup, this is happening.” Sans decides after a moment. “just, uh… you know. i love you. i love you so much. i wanted to bring you somewhere special, but, uh… i dunno. maybe this is okay.” He glances around. “all these people who love you for bein’ you. who know there’s nothin’ wrong with us being together.” He mutters, and it clicks. 

“Sans.” You say quietly, and he gives you a big, adorable, nervous smile. 

“hey, i warned ya.” He laughs, “i told you, uh, it was coming.” Well, he’s not wrong there. Your heart is thudding loudly in your ears, and he mutters, “you gotta tell me if i start to mess this up, ‘k, so i can fix it? i watched movies to see how humans do it, but-”

“Oh, god, Sans.” You sigh, half laughing, half quaking with nerves. You’ve figured it out now, the anxiety he’d had about finding a place to take you on Valentines that would be special, different, _human..._ he wanted to show you that he loved all of you, not just your magic, not just the parts of you that were, well, bony or powerful or unique. He loved all of you. He loved the person you’d been the day you met him, and the person that you’d become. So, then, maybe… wasn’t this the perfect place to be? With the monsters and the humans united, in spite of the storm that was literally outside the door of this place? “You couldn’t mess this up. This is perfect.” You hear yourself murmuring, and that smile grows bigger, almost disbelieving, and he’s suddenly slid out of the booth, fishing in his hoodie pocket. 

Oh, god. He’s kneeling. 

“i want to be there with you. forever and always. no matter what happens. i want to be your partner and your best friend and your family.” He says, sounding a little rough, like he’s speaking through a lump in his throat, one that can’t be there, you know it can’t, but it is. “i love you so much. you’re my sun and my stars. you’re every single new day. i want to be there with you for every single tomorrow.” He says, and god, the room has gone quiet, oh goddamn, every single person in this place is looking at you, and suddenly you’re trying not to cry. This man. This ridiculous, wonderful man, who loved you more than you’d ever dared to hope, who you love back more than you could ever express. 

“oh man, my hands are shakin’.” He laughs to himself, shaking his head as well, but he finally manages to produce a small, wooden box. “i, uh, i hope this is okay.” He mutters under his breath, and opens the box carefully, like he might fumble and the ring would go flying and -

The ring. You recognize that ring. You’d seen it a thousand, thousand times. 

“My mom’s…” You begin, and he nods quickly. 

“did some detective work. someone pawned it, but… i managed to turn it up.” You appreciate that he’s managed to avoid saying the name ‘Paula’ as he’s proposing, but now, you are really and truly crying. Once, that would have made him panic, but now, he knows you, and he knows you’re the furthest thing from upset. 

“I love you so much.” You manage through your tears, wiping your eyes, and a soft “awww” from all those onlookers fills the room. 

“i love you too.” He breathes. “marry me?”

Don’t say ‘duh,’ don’t say ‘duh’- 

“Yes!” You manage, and the room bursts into raucous, joyful applause as he slides the ring onto your left hand, your flesh and blood hand, where it fits - perfectly, you have a second to notice that, before he’s on his feet, and helping you up to your feet, and he’s kissing you, and then it’s just impossible to notice anything else. 

You’re gonna marry a skeleton.  
A monster.  
Your best friend.  
Your soulmate. 

Happy Valentine’s Day.


	87. In Which There Isn't a Lull Before, I Don't Know, Some Kind of Storm or Something

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been thorougly chastized for being remiss on posting my patented Fanart 4 Kidz corner (aka fart4kidz), so let me make sure you all get up to speed:
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> Also I love you.   
> Yes, you. In the shirt there.

You wish you could remember the rest of the evening, just exactly how it had gone. It was a rush, though, over in a flash, and you didn’t even think about taking pictures or anything until the next morning, until the adrenaline rush had finally faded to a sort of deep, profound satisfaction. God, there’d been champagne, right, there’d been more congratulations than you could possibly have kept track of, hugs from old friends and strangers alike… there’d been so many people there that wanted to celebrate this, maybe even needed to celebrate this with you, needed the reminder that here, now, here was proof that humans and monsters didn’t need to hate each other.

And then, you’d cut a doorway home, and it had just been him.

You glance at the sleeping skeleton next to you, the bones of his hand tangled in yours, and you let the first rays of sunlight catch the ring for the first time. Well, not the first time. Just the first time for you. How strange it is, to see it on your hand. You remembered being tiny, god, younger than Frisk, and asking your mom;

“Why do you always wear those?” You’d poked a tiny, accusing finger at the rings on her fingers, and chuckling, she’d explained,

“This one, your dad gave me the day he asked me to marry him. It’s an engagement ring. And this one’s a wedding ring. We both wear those, it’s a way to show that we’ve promised to love each other forever. Just like we promise to love you forever-” And she’d leaned into tickle you, but you’d dodged her, refusing to be deterred, 

“Why isn’t it diamond, though? Engagement rings are supposed to be diamond.”

“Oh and where did you hear that?” She’d laughed. 

“Cartoons! Mom!” You’d been indignant. She laughed some more, then showed you the stone, clearing her throat as she prepared to lecture. 

“Mt. Ebott is known for it’s phosphorescent mineral deposits. It’s theorized that the veins run straight through, even past the barrier. Your father -”

“Booooring.” You’d groaned, and she’d grinned, and the conversation had ended. Now, looking at the stone, the tiny light it was still emitting in the relative darkness of your still bedroom, you wished you’d asked more. Not just about the ring. About everything. In a universe where things were right and fair, they would have been the first people you told last night, your mom and dad, but now-

Sans stirs sleepily, and your mind slides away from that problem. 

“Morning, love.” You murmur, turning on your side so you can see him. He opens his eyes - god, how had that become so normal for you, watching your skeleton boyfriend’s (fiance’s!) eyesockets open up - and he takes a split second to place himself before an enormous grin appears on his face. 

“mornin’.” He whispers, his voice thick and sleepy but more content than you think you’d ever heard it. Drowsily, he shifts and reaches for you, his fingers tracing down your left arm until he finds your hand and your ring, and then he makes a soft, satisfied noise you’ve never heard from him before, a confirmation that everything’s right in the world. It’s enough to make you melt; certainly enough to make you lean over to kiss him, totally cavalier about your morning breath. He doesn’t care. He’s looking at you all bright and happy when you inch away. “we get to tell everyone today.” He says, and you smile. 

“Yeah we do.” You whisper.

“papyrus knows. i mean, that i was askin’, last night. forgot to tell him you said yes.” He chuckles, and you groan, smiling. 

“Poor guy. He’s probably freaking out for you!”

“nah. he said he knew you’d say yes.” He says sleepily. You smile at him, and he shrugs. “he was more sure than me.” You have to laugh at that. 

“Baby, I _told_ you I would!” You point out, and he shrugs again. 

“sometimes people change their mind. i was still scared outta my skull.” He admits, and you laugh again. 

“But it all worked out.” You remind him, and he pulls you in tight. 

“sure as hell did.” He breathes.

\------------------------------------------------------------

“CONGRATULATIONS!” Papyrus booms, the very instant that you show your face in the kitchen doorway. He can’t have seen your hand, so you know that Sans wasn’t lying. Papyrus was certainly confident. He’s rushing over to hug you (and Sans, when he tries to sidle his way around you), leaving a bleary-eyed Undyne and Alphys looking up from their eggs at the kitchen table, confused.

“Why ‘gratulations?” Undyne grumbles, taking a long sip of coffee. 

“IT’S A SECRET, I CAN’T TELL YOU, SANS SAID SO! BROTHER, THIS EMBARGO IS GETTING A LITTLE RIDICULOUS!” Papyrus complains, and you grin at him, wondering how long he’d been itching to talk about it. “THERE ARE SO MANY THINGS I WANT TO SAY, BUT IF I DO-”

“s’ok, bro, she, uh, knows now. not a secret anymore.” Sans laughs, looking rather pleased with himself. 

“OH! IN THAT CASE! LET ME BE THE FIRST TO WELCOME YOU TO THE FAMILY, _______!”

“Bwuhhhhh?” Undyne, who had been looking back down at her eggs, snaps her head back up so quickly that you can hear her neck crack. Alphys lets out a high pitched squeal that you had’t from her before (outside of the context of exciting developments in anime), then whispers, 

“Really???!” Blushing, you extricate yourself from Papyrus and extend your hand so they can see the ring. 

“Sans proposed last night, at Grillby’s.” You explain quietly. Undyne takes in a very slow breath as Alphys continues to make soft “eeeeee” noises next to her.

“You… jerk!” She finally says, standing and pointing her finger at Sans. He gives her a quizzical look, but doesn’t seem particularly insulted. “Why didn’t you tell me! I would have been there! I would have been there with a sign and a bullhorn and one of those giant foam fingers cheering you on!” She grumbles, fully indignant. Sans snickers. 

“uh. yeah. ‘s why.” He says, and Undyne thinks about this for a second, narrowing her wide yellow eye as she processes this. 

“...Oh.” She mutters, then suddenly, an enormous, thrilled grin crosses her face. “HECK YEAH, THOUGH!” Without warning, she bounds over the chair in front of her and tackles you in a hug.

(“eeeeeee,” Alphys continues.)

“YOU’RE GETTING MARRIED, YOU HUGE DORKS!” She says, squeezing you so hard that you have to go limp to avoid being bruised. “YOU’RE ACTUALLY GETTING MARRIED, I CAN STOP TEASING YOU ABOUT IT!” She turns back to Alphys, still holding you. “BABY WE DID IT!”

“ _you_ did it?” Sans demands, and Undyne plops you down on your feet to hug him too. 

“Heck yeah, you bony nerd, we were wing-ladies like you wouldn’t even believe, you owe me so bad!” She declares exultantly. Alphys gulps in a breath and nods in agreement. 

“W-we totally were!” She agrees, and you have to chuckle at the two of them for taking so much credit. 

“Ok, guys.” You agree placidly, watching Sans squirm in Undyne’s grasp. “Great work. You did it.” You grin at Undyne as she releases Sans, and just have time to catch Sans giving her a very, _very_ smug look before she’s hugging you again, and the celebration begins once more. 

It takes forever to get to work. 

\--------------------------------------------------

“Engaged?” Capra says, looking between you and Sans slowly. You’d gone up to his office - he was actually there for once, not at Sans’ side down in the labs. “But, like… why?” Sans stares at him, then buries his face in his hands. 

“i can’t.” He mutters, and peeks up at you. “why is he like this.” 

“I don’t know.” You sigh. Capra’s brow furrows. 

“Is it like… is it a money thing?” He asks, then holds up his hand to shield Sans’ view of his mouth as he forms the words ‘get a pre-nup!’ You roll your eyes at him, and he sighs. “Fine, fine. Congratulations, I hope you enjoy your… _monogamy_.” He says the word like it’s the foulest epithet he can think of, but manages to maintain a smile. You burst out laughing, and he finally gives in and grins. “Seriously. Good job, if that’s what you guys want. But… wait, what are you going to do? Monsters and humans can’t get married yet, you guys know that, right?” He says, suddenly sounding genuinely concerned. You glance at Sans. You hadn’t actually, well, talked about that bit. 

“they can in the underground.” Sans says with a shrug. “asgore will marry us, or i’ll sic a damn blaster on him.” 

“Hm?” Capra looks confused. 

“Oh, the uh, you know, the big skulls. Like Spot.” You supply, and his brow furrows. 

“...There’s more of those? Wait. Don’t use Spot. I like Spot. What if Spot gets hurt -” 

“relax, buddy. you met asgore. you really think he’d have a problem-” Sans begins, and Capra snorts. 

“With humans and monsters getting married? Christ, I forgot what a beautiful idiot you can be.” He leans forward from his chair to rap his knuckles on Sans’ head. “ _He doesn’t like humans and magic mixing._ ” He reminds the two of you. Sans’ eyesockets widen, then his jaw sets resolutely. 

“we’ll figure somethin’ out.” He says stubbornly, looking up at you. You smile at him, and suddenly it doesn’t seem like the legality of your marriage will be such a huge obstacle, all things considered. You’d figure something out. 

“Well, the amount I pay you, you’d better at least have gotten her a decent fucking rock.” Capra continues blithely, craning his neck to see your hand. Oh, right, you’re expected to just show people, you keep forgetting that this is the thing that’s done. Sans makes an irritated grumble as you hold your hand out and Capra gives him a slow, withering glance. “Seriously, pal? That’s just some gravel- wait. I know this ring. That was...” He gets out of his chair to study the ring, then beams at Sans. “I take it back. Well done.” Sans blinks at him, then looks mollified. 

“woulda been cheaper to get a diamond, had to hire a p.i.-” 

“Sans!” You say, turning to look at him in disbelief. He grins at you, unrepentant. 

“worth it to see the look on your face.” 

“Hey, hey, speaking of which.” Capra interjects. “________, what’s been going on with your research? Find me anything else good in your parents’ stuff?” You sigh, shaking your head. 

“It’s been really slow. All the books in that language, whatever it is, they’re all histories, and they’ve all been totally redacted. I can tell you that humans were the aggressors in the war, but I don’t have any idea what the mages were doing to get so powerful, or why they decided to drive the monsters underground in the first place, or where they all went after the barrier was erected.” You say, rubbing your eye. “I did find out some more stuff about the books themselves. I took one to the university last week while I was visiting Alphys. She brought me to one of the antiquities professors, and he called in an archaeology professor and a literature professor, and the consensus is that the book was made in the late seventeen-hundreds, and it was probably made right around here, based on the binding techniques and the type of paper.” 

“Huh.” Capra says, then sighs. “I don’t know what to do with that.” 

“Join the club.” You mutter. Capra thinks on this, then nods at you and turns to Sans. 

“How about you, bud? Any optimistic sounding news from the king? Any hints that we might get a bite at the core?”

“you don’t eat cores, if you’re doing an apple thing.” Sans says, then groans and shakes his head. “but no. it’s been more of the same deadlock, now that people are beginning to relax after the attack.” Capra grits his teeth. 

“Almost makes me wish that they’d do it … nah.” He thinks better of what he was about to say, and rubs his temples. “Well, between you and me, guys, I’m beginning to run out of options. We obviously haven’t been profitable since the barrier fell, and… forget it. I’ll figure something out. But, uh, in the meantime, _______, please keep trying to crack how humans put the damn thing up in the first place, and Sans… you got that beautiful mind, pal, you keep using it. I’ll be down in the lab later to bug you, just gotta finish this… funding proposal.” He says, then sighs. “Less thrilling than yours, I’m sure.”

“wasn’t a funding proposal, pal, just a regular one.”

“You keep telling yourself that.” Capra snickers, and then locks eyes with you again. “Seriously. Pre-nup. I know a guy-” 

“Goodbye, Capra.” You laugh, holding the door open for Sans. On the way out, Doris stops you, breathless;

“I heard that you two got engaged!” She says, as cheerful as you’ve ever heard her. “Congratulations! Can I see the ring?” And the process begins anew. You get the sense that you’ll be doing this over and over again for the next few weeks. Seeing the pleased expression on Sans’ face as Doris admires your ring, you decide you don’t mind that one bit. 

\------------------------------- 

Of course, it’s not just your wedding that you need to start thinking about. Undyne and Alphys’ wedding is less than two months away, and as you begin to focus on that, you find that the weeks move hideously fast. Even with Mettaton taking care of so much of the organization; the flower arranging, the seating, negotiating with the university caterers, even getting his cousin to serve as a DJ… well, there’s still a million things to do. Plus, well, you’re making no headway at work, and it turns out that stressed out, irritable Capra is not half as much fun to hang out with as regular Capra. He never blames anything on you, of course. Never seems upset or perturbed that it’s been taking you literal months to get through a handful of dusty old books. No, the more worried he gets, you discover, the better behaved he is. By the beginning of April, he’s being downright sweet to you. It’s thoroughly unnerving.

At least there’s been no new appearances by your favorite humans in black to stress you out. 

“We could elope?” You tell Sans, somewhat wistfully, a week and a half before Alphys and Undyne’s ceremony. You’d come home from a headache inducing day at work to discover that the table arrangements needed to be reconfigured - again - because Alphys’ cousins had decided to venture out from Hotland after all. Which was wonderful, but it ruined, well, everything, you thought, looking at the seating chart spread out on the dining room table. “Otherwise, we’re gonna have to do all this stuff all over again, but it’ll be worse, because it’ll be us-”

“shh.” He laughs. “d’you really wanna elope?”

“Of course not.” You groan. “It’s just… gah, I want to make this perfect for them! They deserve it!”

“you’re doin’ great.” He says, pulling you close to nuzzle your neck. “better than i am for sure. and you got that bachelorette party all planned for tomorrow, so, your biggest thing is almost over, huh? after this, you can sit back an’ let undyne do all the hard work for us.” He snickers, pleased by the prospect. You can’t help it, you grin at him. 

“My fiance is lazy.” You remark. 

“you love it.” He replies, holding you closer still and looking, well, like he is up to no good. Which, right now, is fine by you.

“Wish you could come to the Undyne party.” You sigh, and he grins. 

“me too, but someone’s gotta do the alphys party.” He laughs, leaning in to kiss your neck. You suspect suddenly that he might have designs to ease you back onto the dining room table, so you sidestep him quickly. He pouts at you, confirming your suspicions. 

“I spent forever on that seating chart, don’t you dare!” You scold, then grin - oh, god, you just can’t stop with the grinning these days. 

“mmf, fine.” He laughs, taking your hand and leading you pointedly out of the room. 

“And where are we going?” You laugh. 

“somewhere where you won’t have to think about where alphys’ fifteenth cousin twice removed can sit. bedroom? bedroom.” He says, as if this is an decision that makes perfect sense. 

...It makes less than perfect sense, but looking at the mischievous look on your fiance’s face, you decide you can worry about all of that later. This seems much more fun. 

It’s not that you’re a bad bridesmaid, you decide, much later. It’s simply that you’re a spectacular fiancee.


	88. In Which Things Begin To Fall Irreparably To Shit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Fanart 4 Kids](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> Remember that you can always support your local Trashmom [here!](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)

Undyne’s and Alphys’ bachelorette parties are the first thing on your mind when you wake up, the morning of those particular, illustrious events. 

“Babe.” You nudge Sans awake. “Did you pick up Mountain Dew for Alphys?”

“mmmph.” Sans grumbles unhelpfully. “wazzat?” 

“Mountain Dew! Oh, god, it’s this soda, she loves it, she drinks gallons, she’ll want it at her party, I’ll make sure I go to the store and …” You trail off. He’s grinning at you. “You got it already.” 

“yep.” He snickers. “babe, i am totally set. i got mountain dew, popato chisps, the entire dub box set for mew mew kissy whatever - one, don’t worry. i invited all her friends, i got paps to teach me how to make ramen, i am on top of this.” 

“Of course you are.” You sigh, sitting up and stretching (and then kicking half-heartedly at him when he wolfwhistles). “Well, I did my best to find penis shaped everything. I think Undyne will be delighted tonight. I mean… I don’t one hundred percent get _why_ she wants penis shaped everything, but-”

“so she can throw the same kind of party for you when it’s our turn.” Sans snickers, a maniacal grin on his face. “and unlike her, you’re gonna get embarrassed.” You wince - you suspect he might be right. 

“Mmm, we’ll just see about that.” You laugh, then yawn. “Man. Throw this party, and then it’s just, like… a week until they get married! Kind of crazy, huh?” 

“yeah.” He sighs. “so much has happened…” He looks up at you, and gives you a particularly adorable smile. You nudge him again with your leg, much more affectionately, then rub your eyes. 

“Babe, I’m gonna go in early to work so I can cut out a few hours early.” You advise him.

“mmm. i’m not. just cuttin’ out early.” He snickers. You roll your eyes. 

“You should be nicer to Capra.” You say, then blink. “Did I just say that?” Another quiet snicker rises from Sans’ pillow. 

“maybe. think you worry too much. he’s like a cat. he’ll land on his feet.” He mutters, but you shake your head. 

“I don’t think this time. He had like, two days worth of stubble yesterday.”

“maybe he’s growin’ a beard.” Sans offers. 

“And he looks like he’s lost weight. I don’t think he’s eating.” You forge on. 

“diet.” He says blithely. 

“And yesterday, he texted me out of the blue to tell me that he really values our friendship and he thinks that I’m a wonderful and sincere person.” You say. Sans looks up from his pillow. 

“...maybe i should be a little nicer. that’s just wrong.” He breathes. 

“I’ll bring him some food.” You sigh. “You… I dunno. Maybe invite him to Alphys’ party tonight? I’m sure she won’t mind. Might take his mind off things.” 

“...yeah.” Sans sighs, reaching for his phone. You kiss his brow, climb out of bed, get dressed, and go downstairs to make two egg sandwiches. 

\-----------------------------------------------------

It is still, technically, the ass crack of dawn when you get to EbbCo. You’ve never been here this early. You’re not sure anyone has. Except, well… there’s Capra’s stupid self-driving car in the parking lot. Did he even go home last night? Sighing and wondering how this man had ever managed to take care of himself before you and Sans had showed up (and pointedly ignoring the fact that he’d taken care of _you_ , once upon a time), you press your shoulder into the front door, juggling egg sandwiches and two thermoses of coffee. It’s locked, of course. 

“Should have figured that one out.” You mutter to yourself, looking up at the building. Oh, hell, only Capra will be here anyway. Concentrating hard, you slice a doorway in front of you, and step up onto the eighth floor, where Capra’s office is located. 

All the lights are off, and you groan, realizing this had probably been futile. He must be downstairs, lurking in one of the cavernous lab spaces, searching for that miracle that would keep EbbCo afloat. Oh well. Taking the foil wrapped sandwich and the cup of coffee, you leave them on Doris’ desk, then glance around for a piece of paper to leave a note for her or Capra, whoever got upstairs first. 

Ugh, it’s tidy up here. You can’t find any scrap paper, but you recall there being a supply closet next to Capra’s office. That seems like the kind of place where post-it notes would be, right? You clomp down the hallway and try the door - locked. Well…. you’d already gotten around that problem once today. You concentrate on the space behind the door, and cut another doorway in the air. It’s dark and musty on the other side, so with another groan - this day was already ridiculous - you fish your phone out and turn on the flashlight function. 

Oh. 

Shit. 

This is not a supply closet. 

There are two things in this room. The first thing that catches your eye are, well…

All the goddamn guns. Oh. Oh, that is a lot of guns. That is so many guns. Why are there so many, many guns? If there is one thing a small, local power company doesn’t need, it’s a room with several hundred guns lining the walls. For a long moment, you just keep shining the light over them, trying to figure out what you’re looking at as your mind staggers and trips. Then, your beam of light hits something else. 

It’s a book. It is a book that is fully unlike the books you’ve been looking at. This book is OLD - hell, it’s under glass, there’s this weird little display shelf right in Capra’s weird little… gun room - but it looks like one of those things that you’d see at a museum for like, truly, truly old things. God, what are you even thinking? That doesn’t make sense, but your head is spinning, your breath is coming fast, and - 

And that’s the sound of the elevator opening, only fifty or so feet away from you. 

“Doris. I need you to - oh, is that breakfast? Fuck yeah!” Capra’s familiar voice is echoing from the reception area. “Doris, you’re an angel. I take back all those things I ever said about you, you’re not cranky and stern and I don’t just keep you around because I’m worried you’d break your hip if you were left to your own devices!” He calls out cheerfully, and you can hear his footsteps coming closer. Oh, fuck. 

Acting very, very quickly, and not really thinking about the consequences, you cut still another doorway - no, that’s not right, it’s more like a window. You make a portal right through that glass barrier, and, refusing to second guess yourself, you snatch up the book and - underneath it, a spiral notebook. You don’t have time to think about what that means. In a panicked rush, you seal the window and cut one last slice, one last portal home, back to your bedroom, where your innocent fiance has fallen back asleep. He jerks awake as you come clattering through, breathing hard, then squints at you. 

“...uh, that was fast.”

“Oh fuck. Oh. Fuck. Sans. There is a bad thing. Fuck.” You whisper, trying to catch your breath, staring down at the books in your hands. There’s writing on the cover of the ancient book, a binding that feels sickeningly like… ugh, like skin. It’s those same strange hieroglyphs, but as you stare at it, they begin to resolve into something more readable. 

“To Extracte Magick From The Monsteres Most Foule.” 

“what are you lookin’- babe, what is that.” He’s out of bed now, he’s staring at you and the books and the lights in his eyes are bright. You can’t speak right now. You can hardly think. You open the cover, and there, in gruesome detail, is an ancient sketch, the kind you can remember seeing from illuminated texts, the type of things that monks used to obsess over in their cells. They’d drawn images of angels, demons, saints, animals, but… oh, god, nothing like this. It’s a drawing of a woman - a monster - a being that bears more than a passing resemblance to Undyne, strapped to some terrible dungeon wall by a device that looks, well, medieval. Which, you think darkly, is probably appropriate. From both wrists, the artist had inked blood in a red that was still vivid, hundreds and hundreds of years later, dripping down into some sort of basin, and there’s a goblet inked next to it and…

Your mind flashes to an episode of The Twilight Zone you’d seen, god, years and years ago, sitting on your dad’s lap and peeking over a blanket. The aliens in it, they’d seemed like they had good intentions, they’d all been issued a book called “To Serve Man,” but then, the twist…

“It’s a cookbook.” You breathe out loud, and sit down, hard, on the bed. Sans stares at you, mystified, until you manage to pass the book over. Your vision spinning, you turn to the spiral notebook, and open to a random page, reading the first thing you see, “for monsters whose veins carry no blood, consumption of the dust left by their passing will suffice, for the magical qualities remain imbued for several days…” You trail off, shaking. “Sans. Sans. He lied to us. He let us trust him.”

“what is this?” Sans whispers.

“It’s Capra’s. It was next to his office. In a room. With guns. Sans, he tricked us all, he let us think, he… he’s desperate for magic, and he figured out how to get some.” You shudder. “The missing monsters. The ‘research,’ oh god. Did he want me to be his mage? Did he think I would…” You inhale sharply, then look at Sans. “There were so many guns. I think the guys, the people in black, I think he was arming them… I think he wants the barrier back up, or, or something, I…”

“hey.” Sans is standing stock still, but he manages to make his voice soft and soothing, even though the lights in his eyes are almost non existent. “hey, it’s gonna be ok. we gotta… we just gotta think about how to deal with this. who do we go to.” 

“Asgore.” You say quickly. “He’ll-”

“yeah. yeah. asgore. i’ll…” He looks at you, and grimaces. “what’s the notebook?” 

“I think it’s what he translated so far.” You supply, still shaking, and he nods quickly. 

“good. ok. i’ll take asgore the book and explain what happened. you should come with-” He starts, then falters. “no. you should stay. find out what capra knows, but let’s not tell asgore, right?” He breathes. “you remember what he said about, uh, digging?” He takes a breath, then bellows, “fuck!” All of a sudden, his fury breaks over him. “i trusted him! i trusted that asshole!” He says. “i thought he cared about us! i thought he was my goddamn friend!”

“I know, baby, I know…” You whisper. You’d been thinking the same thing, reeling from this betrayal. 

“all that fucking talk about saving the world. about loving magic. well i suppose he did, huh. suppose he does. guy runs a fucking power company. shouldn’t be a surprise that he wants power.” Sans hisses, looking furious still. “babe, i-”

“Go to Asgore.” You urge. “Now. I’ll figure out what he knows.” 

“stay safe?” He whispers, and you laugh bitterly and nod. 

“Anyone tries to hurt me, I’ll be gone before they even know I’m here.” You promise, clutching the spiral notebook so hard that the rings begin to hurt your hand. He takes a step, then turns, and kisses you roughly. 

“‘s gonna be ok.” He whispers. “we’re gonna do something big. we’re gonna save people. s’ ok.” He reaches out and grasps your hand, holding it tight for a second, and then he holds the big book close to his chest, and he slices a doorway, stepping through into the underground and leaving you, for the moment, on your own. 

You hear the sound of Undyne’s car pulling out of the driveway and you consider chasing after her for a moment, then you shudder. God. No. Tonight was their big bachelorette parties, and you didn’t want to ruin anything, and… and there was nothing you could do. It was all in Asgore’s hands now. He’d figure something out, right? And you, you’d be there for your friends, you’d try to make it seem like everything was normal.

Before Sans returns home, the texts start:

Capra: Hey, uh, you sick?  
Capra: Or, you know, your fiance.  
Capra: I ask because neither of you are here.  
Capra: And, uh, me and the bonehead had some pretty big experiment plans for the day.  
Capra: Wink.  
Capra: Seriously though.  
Capra: Can you tell me you’re okay?  
Capra:... you’re beginning to worry me, pal.  
Capra: I’m gonna come over and check on you guys. 

Fuck! You glance at the clock. It’s almost noon. Oh, god, you can’t have Capra here. 

_______: Hey, sorry. We’re ok. We got the flu or something. 

Totally convincing. You’re glaring at your phone when Sans steps back in. 

“he’s gonna deal with it. he’s talking to the human authorities now. they’re uh, surrounding the place. waiting for a warrant. might be a while, since, uh, you know, nobody can read that book but you and monsters.” He mutters. “but they’ll see any groups of people trying to get those guns.” 

“Oh thank god.” You whisper, just as your phone dings. 

Capra: Oh, gross. But phew. Don’t scare me like that. Thought they’d got you.

It’s enough to make you throw the phone across the room. 

“Fuck.” You whisper quietly, shaking your head, then look up at Sans. “This book, Sans. They… the old mages. They were like vampires. They _ate_ monsters.” 

“i know.” Sans murmurs, sitting back down next to you. “fuck. that’s awful.” He looks up at you, eyes urgent. “all those missing monsters…” 

“I know.” You echo him. “All from EbbCo. Where Capra had access. And he’s got that, that soul. Never seen another human with a soul like that. He’s gotta be doing… oh god.” You shiver again. Sans wraps his arms around you. 

“asgore’s gonna stop it.” He breathes. “we gotta trust him.”

“Yeah.” You nuzzle into his neck, looking for something to ground you, keep you from screaming. He clenches his teeth, then mutters, 

“c’mon. no point sitting here worrying about it. let’s, uh, let’s start decorating for the parties tonight.” You meet his eyes, and he echoes your thought process. “it’s not like it’s any less safe to have them now than it’s ever been. everyone’ll be here. everything will be okay. asgore will tell us if he needs us, but right now, it looks like the human government is stepping up.” 

“Okay.” You whisper, your head still swimming, then you take a deep breath and begin to cry. Sans holds you tightly, resolutely, until the tears stop coming, which takes some time.

“s ok.” He keeps repeating. “‘s gonna be ok.” 

\------------------------------------------

Eventually, you find the will to move. Eventually, you’re no longer so panicked that you feel like you have to stay frozen, quivering like a trapped animal, in your room. You take Sans’ hand, and you finish decorating the house, together, trying to ignore the tension in the air, the alternating waves of fury and despair and fear that threaten to swamp your soul. It’s gonna be okay. Sans had said so. Asgore will protect his people, just like they did last time. Capra will be caught and punished. The men in black will be disarmed. It’ll be fine. 

Undyne comes home, and you tell her the news quietly, pushing through the horror to make sure she understands. She’s furious, of course. She screams and punches the recliner and curses Capra straight to hell and back, but eventually she calms down enough to confirm that, yes, she’s going to have the party. That it’ll be better than sitting around, waiting for news. Your legs and arms feel cramped, flooded with adrenaline for a fight that’s not happening, preparing for something terrible that isn’t going to reach you. 

You’re being ridiculous. You just need to wait until Alphys comes home, and then you can slap a smile on and pretend to be happy and pretend that all you want to do is throw a party where all the food is shaped like dicks. 

But of course…

Alphys doesn’t come home.


	89. In Which Things Begin To Fall Irreparably To Shit II: Even Shittier

“She’s two hours late.” 

“i know, undyne.”

“She still isn’t answering my calls.” Undyne’s pacing the foyer so quickly that you’re surprised she’s not burning a track in the hardwood; every fourth or fifth circuit she pauses, stares out the window like she’s expecting to see Alphys’ little yellow bug come sailing down the driveway. It isn’t coming. 

“maybe she just got nervous. it’s a big night.” Sans says softly, but you can tell that his heart isn’t in it. He thinks the worst. 

So do you. 

“Damn it, Sans, you know where she is!” Undyne snaps. Papyrus, watching from the corner, his eyes big and nervous (and a little teary), cringes. 

“we called asgore. twice. he says that nobody’s come in or out of ebbco except for like, the usual employees leaving.” Sans says, for perhaps the hundredth time. You rub your forehead, thinking, trying to keep calm and focused. The bones of your arm feel cool against your clammy skin. 

“She can’t be there if nobody took her in there.” You mutter out loud. It’s become a mantra. “They’ve gotta have her somewhere else. There’s only one way in.” You groan, and pace forward, leaning your head against the window and staring out into the night. Guests will be arriving soon, and one of the bachelorettes is just…. gone. Oh, god, what are they doing to Alphys? What have they already done!?

“wait.” Sans says, slow and calm. “you’re wrong.” You whirl to look at him, your stressed mind already beginning to sort through exactly what words you want to scream, but you see he’s processing something, that he’s miles and miles away. “there’s not just one way in.” He breathes. “oh. fuck. he told me. the fucker told me, day one.” He hisses. “he promised no monster could get trapped down in the caverns! he told me, there’s stairwells leading out on every floor! the caverns go for almost a mile under ebbco, those stairs could lead out… fuck. fuck.” His eyes are burning bright now, and he shifts with barely contained energy. “fuck, the observation stations at the very least. i’m bettin’ they all have stairs underneath ‘em… babe. are there stations by toriel’s house?”

Oh god. Oh god, he’s right. “At least three that I can remember.” You whisper. “The men in black that night, how they disappeared, how nobody could even find them… they were in the caverns underground. That’s where Capra keeps them.”

“And that’s where Alphys is!” Undyne barks. “What the _fuck_ are we waiting for, let’s go!” 

“undyne.” Sans gives her a pained look. “we can’t. asgore said-”

“Listen here.” She strides forward and catches Sans by the front of his shirt. Sans gulps, and holds very still, and you take an instinctive step forward before you catch yourself. “I don’t give a flying fuck about warrants. Or the human authorities. Or anything. If she was down there.” She jerks her head at you. “You would already be there. So open up a goddamn door for me, or I swear to god, I will make you.” You’ve never heard Undyne sound like this before. Sans looks over at you for a moment, ignoring the hand bunched up on his shirt. After a long, tense moment, he lets out a hissing sigh, then nods. 

“you’re not going alone.” He mutters, and you nod instantly. 

“We’re coming.” You say firmly. Sans glances at you, and for a second you’re braced to snap at him, ready for him to argue, for him to tell you that you’re not allowed. He thinks for a moment, then he nods. 

“I-I WOULD LIKE TO COME TOO!” Papyrus whimpers from the corner. You open your mouth, but Sans is already shaking his head. 

“need you here, bro.” He says, shaking loose from Undyne and walking over to Papyrus. “if alphys comes home, we need to know. ‘sides. people are gonna be coming here. too late to call ‘em off. just stay here, keep people calm. i’ll have my phone. we all will. we’ll be as fast as we can.” He mutters. 

“BUT BROTHER, I-”

“paps.” Sans’ voice is soft and pleading. “do this for me.” Papyrus looks down at him for a long, long moment, a distant intelligence in his eyes, and then he bends over and hugs Sans, tight. 

“BRING BACK OUR ALPHYS.” He says, and then turns to you. “HUMAN, YOU ARE VERY FAST. USE THAT. UNDYNE, YOU MUST BE QUIET. I FEAR THERE WILL BE MORE OF THEM THAN YOU ARE PREPARED TO FIGHT.” He says, and there’s a strange, calculating tone to his voice. “YOU MUST STAY HIDDEN AND MOVE QUICKLY. WATCH EACH OTHER’S BACKS. YOU ARE AT THE MOST RISK IF YOU SEPARATE.” 

Undyne takes a deep breath, then nods. “Okay, Papyrus.” She says, her voice a little rough. You nod too. He steps forward and looks very, very seriously at you. 

“YOU MUST STAY SAFE. YOU ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO MY BROTHER. YOU ARE ALSO VERY IMPORTANT TO ME. YOU ARE GOING TO BE MY SISTER.” He says, and hugs you as well, though this time, he’s more gentle than you’d realized he was capable of being. 

“I will.” You murmur, your face pressed against his best “party” hawaiian shirt. 

“Okay. We need to move.” Undyne says. “One of you-” 

“on it.” Sans mutters, and thinks for a second before tracing a doorway to a space that’s pitch black. It hovers menacingly in your foyer, a perfect rectangle of darkness. Undyne doesn’t hesitate. She steps through, then turns around to look at you. You move next, but before you do, Sans catches your hand and holds it tight, just for a moment. You squeeze back, your heart thudding wildly in your chest. Then he releases you, and you step through the doorway, hearing Spot’s frantic keening for a split second. Then Sans is through, behind you, and the only light you can make out for a second is the dim glow of your ring. 

“Where are we-”

“shhh. one of the lab rooms. not a lot of space, but when we turn the corner, it’s gonna light up, there’s lava.” Sans warns, his voice nearly inaudible. Undyne takes in a breath. 

“Sans, she’s down here, I can _feel_ her, I know she’s down here-”

“good.” Sans breathes, and your eyes adjust enough that you can see him nod. “k. we move quiet, quick, we-”

“No you don’t.” The voice comes a split second after something cold and hard presses into against your head. You instinctively try to turn, and someone grips your side, hard. “No.” He says sharply, and then barks out another, “NO!” Sans stops, halfway in the middle of doing whatever motion he’d been about to do, and the man holding you growls, “I don’t have to kill her, but I will if you make this hard.” 

“Sans, go, get out of here!” You say quickly, suddenly processing what the cold thing is. Goddamn it, you had never pictured that your life would feature so many damn GUNS. For a second, you almost want to laugh, but that’s just the hysteria settling in, the realization that with a gun to your head, it doesn’t matter how many spears you have, how many doorways you can cut, you are just well and truly fucked. 

“like hell i will.” Sans growls, and looks up at your captor. “whaddya want.” He says, flatly, but with a world of hatred behind that false affect. 

“You’re going to come with me. Two feet ahead. Both of you. One false step and I shoot.” The man whispers. “Done it before, I’ve got no problem doing it again.” 

“Sans.” Undyne whispers roughly, but Sans nods after only a second. 

“fine. figure you’re not killin’ us for a reason right now. lessgo.” He says, looking at Undyne, then you. “babe, listen to him.” Oh, fuck. 

“Okay…” You whisper, and slowly, painstakingly, this man frogmarches you, Sans and Undyne out of the dark cavern and into the light of the next room. 

The space is massive, dominated in the center by a broken looking, half melted prototype of a core design, sitting in a pool of what has to be lava. Or was it magma, down here? Oh, god, get a grip, _______, you can’t lose it now! The… whatever, lava, it was casting light, but there were more lights, enormous industrial fluorescent things bolted to the ceiling, sending regular shafts of light vertically through the enormous cavern. Were there ways out? God, there was the door you’d come through from that dark lab, there were the elevator doors, shining so promisingly against the far wall of the cavern, and there was…. a staircase, an emergency fire exit, goddamn, resting against that wall, marked with an exit sign like fire codes mattered down here…

The space is _filled_ with people. This has got to be everyone who had attacked Toriel’s house, and then some. They’re all wearing black. They’re all wearing featureless black masks. 

They’re all holding guns. 

They’re standing evenly spaced, at attention, facing the ruined prototype. As your captor leads you through the rows of them, you can see the whites of their eyes behind the masks, their pupils darting to you for a split second before they look away, at the space in the center of the room that has their attention. As you draw closer, you see that a crude wooden platform has been erected in front of that melted prototype. There’s a shape of a person there, backlit by the lava bubbling behind them. The lighting is so strange, your head is swimming so much, that it takes forever for you to make the person resolve themselves in your vision. 

Oh, god.

That isn’t Capra. 

Your captor drops you, Sans and Undyne in front of the makeshift stage, and Doris peers kindly down at you from her perch on the platform. 

“Well, there you finally are!” She says cheerfully. “We figured we’d be hearing from you today!” 

For a long minute, your mind stutters, and then everything coalesces all at once. It seems like it’s happening to Sans too. He exhales a slow, sharp, “fuck.” 

“Who the hell are you?!” Undyne snarls. Doris sighs softly. 

“Quiet her.” She orders your captor, and the gun moves away from your head at last. For a moment you’re relieved, and then you realize why that had happened. There’s no point in keeping a muzzle to your head when hundreds of guns are pointed at you, Sans and Undyne. The man stalks over to Undyne, raising his pistol to strike her in the face, and you cry out, instantly, 

“She’ll be quiet! She’ll be quiet. Please!” Doris contemplates you from her perch, then nods at your captor. He stands down, and filters back into the crowd of people in black. Undyne looks wildly at you, and you repeat again, this time staring at her, “Please.” Undyne grimaces, then nods.

“Good girl. Smart, being compliant.” Doris says, so sweetly you almost expect her to offer you a butterscotch next. You look up at her, tears threatening to form in your eyes, as the magnitude of her betrayal begins to wash over you. “It was you. All this time. You’ve been financing these people, trying to hurt the monsters?” You have to fight to make your voice audible. “I thought it was Capra-”

“Peter Capra is not cut out for his position.” Doris snaps suddenly. “The man’s a fool. He doesn’t understand that sometimes sacrifices must be made for the good of everybody. He’s just like your parents. Working for them was just as painful as working for him is.” She shakes her head slowly. “They were trying to take down the barrier. Idiots.” She shakes her head disparagingly at you. “If they hadn’t enlisted me to help with their research, I wouldn’t have known. I wouldn’t have found … my book.” She forms the words reverently, softly, caressing them. 

You can feel Sans seethe next to you, you can feel his fury bubbling. Oh, god, he must be so mad. Not just that you’re here, not that you’re in danger, but that a supervillain has you in her possession and she’s goddamn _monologuing._ It’s almost enough to make you burst out laughing. This tiny octogenarian has you captive in an underground lair. And she’s explaining her entire plan to you. This is happening. This is your life. 

“You’d best wipe that smirk off your face, missy.” She hisses. “Does this feel like a game to you? Oh, I shouldn’t be surprised. Everything was all fun and games with your parents. ‘Oh, whoopie, here you go, Doris, translate these books, research this genealogy, make me a magical family tree! There’s a fun project for you in your old age!’” She mimics harshly, then hisses, “I. Went. To. Yale.” You stare up at her, watching little flecks of spittle fly from her mouth, and realize for the first time that you’re dealing with the truly unhinged. 

“Oh, I translated their books. _My book._ I solved its secrets. And do you know what I discovered? The barrier - it’s like a human mage’s soul. It draws the magic from the captives, and then we humans can draw from the barrier! So neat, so clean! Make a bubble around the beasts, and we harvest from them like we would milk or wool or eggs or meat, but this. This was magic. And your parents, they were already doing it! They made a turbine, they made a… a fortune, and they were going to knock it all down, just because they were curious! Just because they wanted to meet the beasts!” She screeches.

“you killed ‘em. you killed her parents.” Sans finally speaks up, sounding horrified and furious all at once. Doris gazes down on him, giving him a disgusted look. 

“No, you filthy thing. They managed that themselves. Or… perhaps someone else did. It did always seem too neat and clean. I wish I could meet her. I’d shake her hand.” She cackles, then scowls abruptly. “And then… you.” She spits, looking at Sans and Undyne. “You were safe down there. You were happy. But no, you had to try to take what isn’t yours, and now the barrier is down and this whole mess is _your fault._ ”

“Their fault?” You can’t keep yourself quiet. “Doris, they didn’t do anything-”

“They took down the damn barrier!” She shrieks. “And now my equity in EbbCo, my stocks, my retirement account - WORTHLESS!” For a second, you reel, then your jaw drops open. 

“This is about _money?_ ”

“You say that like it’s _nothing._ ” She whispers. “Spoiled little rich girl. Can’t comprehend. Your parents wanted to tear down the barrier while my sister was DYING. Who would have paid for her bills then, hm? Who would have supported her through the chemo, if I didn’t have this job, if EbbCo couldn’t pay me-”

“you’re insane.” Sans says flatly. 

“I’m _awake_.” She replies. “And so are all these people. You know, I used to go for walks on Mt. Ebott, after Noreen passed, two years ago. I walked all over that mountain, and I found such, such clarity. I would step into this meadow, and each time I could almost hear her voice. Such a sweet voice. ‘You have to look out for yourself in this world.’” She quotes slowly. “‘It’s kill or be killed here.’” She sighs, rapturous, and then snarls again, remembering who she’s talking to. “So I’ll be reasonable. I’ll give you a chance to look out for yourself.”

“reasonable my ass-” Sans starts, and Doris’ lip twitches. 

“Do not test me. That fish thing. I don’t need her.” She breathes. “Keep talking and she’ll be the first to go.” Sans tenses further - from the corner of your eye, you can see his jaw clenching - but he very slowly inclines his head. 

“We are going to resurrect the barrier.” Doris says, suddenly adopting a schoolteacher voice. “We are going to resurrect the barrier, and you are going to make that happen, my dear. In return, you can have your… skeleton, if you must. The rest will go back underground, of course. Back where they belong.” 

“BACK WHERE THEY BELONG!” This seems to be a cue, because the room of people in black let loose a full throated shout as they chant after her. 

“No.” You say simply. 

“no.” Sans repeats, only a second after you. 

“It will happen, dearie. One way or the other. If not you, we have a choice. Just a little more time, and she’ll be pliable, I think. Actually, I have a wonderful idea.” She looks out over the crowd, and calls, “Bring me my mage!” She beams down at you cheerfully as some people in the back move, and she murmurs, “‘Do my family tree, Doris! Find out about magic, Doris! Well, I found out. I found out that the blood in your father’s line runs strong. I found out that your grandfather sired _two_ mages. So, let’s have a little family reunion.”  
The crowd is parting once more, and you see a hobbled shape being pushed through. She’s so much smaller, moving so much slower, that it takes a minute for you to recognize her. 

“Paula?” You breathe.

“_________? Is that you? RUN!” She shrieks, and the man pulling her up to the front backhands her. When she looks back up, you think her face is bloody from the blow, but after a moment, you realize that blood is old, dried. 

“Well.” Doris sighs. “You’ve worked with her before. You know what she’s like. Not very tractable, is she?” She shakes her head. “She came to us, you know. The anti-monster movement, as she called it. Thought we could get her child, her Frisk back for her. She didn’t think we’d want anything in return.” She clucks her tongue. “And that just isn’t how the world works.”

“___________. I’m so sorry.” Paula breathes, ragged. God, she must have lost fifty pounds, she’s barely a scrap, and her mouth is rimmed with dried blood, and she looks…

“It’s been months. And hardly a scrap of magic from her, even with all the monster blood we’ve been feeding her.” Doris reads your mind. “But you. I’ve heard Capra talking about you. You’re adept. We can use you. So.” She smiles sweetly at you. “Here’s the deal. Be my mage, or I kill the three of you where you stand.” She nods at you, Sans and Undyne. 

“babe, say no.” Sans says instantly. 

“Say no, you … idiot!” Undyne echoes, sounding half mad, something deeper than rage leaking into her voice. “We’re not worth it!” 

You look at Sans out of the corner of your eyes, and you wish, oh god, you wish you could just hold his hand. Just hear him say goodbye. 

“I love you.” You whisper, just loud enough for him to hear it, then clear your throat, trying to chase the lump away, trying to make yourself believe this is really happening. “No.” You rasp. Doris eyes you, and sighs. 

“Very well. Paula. Be my mage, or I kill the girl. And your child, Frisk.” She demands, nodding at you. Paula hesitates, then chokes out, 

“I… I can’t. I can’t.” 

“Well then!” Doris claps her hands together. “This was a waste of time!” With a soft groan, she walks away from the edge of her little stage, then hobbles down some hastily crafted steps, her back straight and dignified even as she winces with each step. She gets down to eye level with you, then looks at Paula. “It was a long shot, anyway. It’ll be so much easier when we get the child. Frisk is only eight, right? Plenty of time to be raised properly.” She sighs. “And so much easier to get to, once the two of you are out of the picture.” She gives Sans and Undyne each a wide, insincere smile, then cuts through the crowd, which parts in front of her, stopping in front of the elevator. It dings once, and Doris waits, patiently, for the doors to slide open. Just as the elevator doors begin to part, she turns around, and calls out, bright and cheerful:

“Kill them.”

You have a breath. An instant. A heartbeat. It seems like no time at all, but in that tiny slice of time, it all spools through your head. Sans. Undyne. Alphys. Papyrus. Mettaton. Frisk. Toriel. Asgore. Fuck, Capra! L.D., Ghost, Tommy, Aaron, Grillby, Gloria, hell, even Jerry. So many faces. So many people. Sans. Sans. 

Sans. 

And as a hundred fingers tighten on a hundred triggers, once again, something in your soul lashes out. 

A bubble bursts from you, a dome, a globe, something purple on the outside, something black on the inside and - oh. OH. 

You had seen this before.

It’s enormous. It fills nearly the entire cavern, with an amount of effort that makes you feel so weak you can barely stand, but there you are, trapped in this globe, with bullets suspended in the air like plastic flakes, and time has _stopped._

This time, you know what to do. Your soul reaches out to Sans, who is frozen, reaching for you, something terrible in his eyes, and he snaps out of his frozen state, whispering, “i love you…” Then he looks at you, seeing you standing there, and he reaches for you, disbelieving, murmuring, “still here, s’ok, still-”

“Sans.” You rush to him, clutch him just for a second, then mutter, “I paused.” He looks up at you, wide-eyed for a moment, then he looks around again, taking in the massive dome, the frozen assailants, the bullets hanging in the air. 

“you stopped… you stopped time.” He repeats after you, then takes a gasping breath. “we’re still alive.” 

“For now.” You whisper, nuzzling into the shearling lining of his hoodie for a split, indulgent second. “We’ve gotta move though. Dunno how long I can make this last.”

“can you wake undyne?” He breathes. You nod quickly, and reach out for her soul as well, using the flagging scraps of what magic you have left inside you-

“ALPHYS!” She cries, then sees you and Sans, and stumbles forward a step. “...Wait. What?” You rush forward, and hug her tightly, as Sans begins, hurriedly, to explain.

\---------------------------------

It turns out that you have all the time in the world, in here. All it takes is a level of concentration, some effort in the back of your head, and the dome around you stays solid, frozen. 

“Time’s not moving on the outside, either.” Undyne reports, after she paces the circle of the bubble. “That psycho’s still out there, waiting for the elevator.” Doris had been the only one out of reach, the only one your pause had failed to stop. Every other human in the room was frozen, guns raised at you, ready to wipe you off the map. 

“so why the bubble?” Sans muses, nudging a masked assailant, then insolently slipping the mask from his face. You watch him for a second, then you figure it out. 

“We can change things in the bubble!” You call out. Sans and Undyne turn to look at you, and at once, you demonstrate, moving to the nearest man in black and wresting the gun out of his grasp. Just as deliberately, you walk over to the frozen pit of lava - magma? and toss the gun in. 

“Oh! Shit!” Undyne crows, catching on. “Sans, can you start tying them up!?”

“on it.” Your fiance says grimly, tearing his first gun free, and then beginning the inglorious process of tying a man up in his own black turtleneck. 

\---------------------------------- 

The three of you work for what feels like hours: gun, lava, tie, gun, lava, tie, and repeat, and repeat, and repeat, until your hands are sore and your mind is swimming and the pressure of the dome around you is really starting to bear on you. Sans is moving them all with his blue magic, slamming them into a disorganized pile against the cavern wall, and you’re trying to prepare, trying to process the fact that soon this dome will be down, soon you’ll have to move again, to tell everyone what you’d seen and heard and learned. You’re sticky with sweat and dizzy with exhaustion, and you still need to find Alphys, somewhere in this hellhole. 

“What do we do with her?” Undyne demands, pointing at Paula with slight distaste. You’ve moved her to the side of the bubble closest to where she came from, out of the path of all those hanging bullets.

“leave ‘er. she might know where the monsters they’re… draining are.” Sans says, apologetically. Undyne looks at the smear of blood around Paula’s mouth and shudders, but she nods quickly. “ok. babe, you ready?” He checks. You’ve positioned yourself on the far side of the bubble, ready for the walls to come down so you can lunge through and get Doris. You clench your jaw, and nod. Just a few more seconds. Just a few more seconds. “undyne, you ready?” Sans checks. 

“Yes! Please! I need to find her-”

Your concentration snaps, and the bubble comes crashing down, and time rushes back in. You stagger, your eyes adjusting to the light, your ears reacting to a hundred gunshots, a hundred bullets flying uselessly to hit the far cavern wall, and Doris, just a few feet away from you, she’s already moving, she’s stepping into the elevator and -

_KRCK._

Peter Capra comes stepping out of the elevator, giving Doris an uppercut that sends her flying back five feet into your arms, where she immediately falls limp. He looks around the room, his mouth hanging open for a second as he tries to process the mayhem, then he seems to give up on that for right now, and he beams. 

“Pretty good entrance though, right? Hey! Guys! I just punched the shit out of an old lady!” He announces, as proud as a puppy that’s just retrieved its first stick. You can’t help it. You stare at him, holding Doris’ sagging body. Across the room, Sans stares at him. Undyne stares at him. Even Paula, beyond confused and out of her trance, stares at him. 

“...What?” You finally try, having to speak loudly over the groans of the men and women that are just now beginning to feel their wounds in their pile by the wall. 

“Um, I was halfway to your house for the party thing when I realized that you said you had the flu? So I turned around to go back to work in the lab, and funniest damn thing, the elevator took me all the way down here and then the doors wouldn’t open, and I had to sit here for like… fifteen minutes while this old hag monologued! Who even monologues?”

“right?” Sans can’t help himself. “ok. but. capra. take her to the fucking cops and then grab any security footage you can find, make a backup and then take that to the cops, too.” He demands, pacing over to your side and immediately enlisting this extra set of hands. “we’re gonna nail these assholes once and for all, so just-” As he’s talking, he’s cutting a doorway to what you assume is the police station, but it turns out, that doesn’t really matter, because he makes one slice, and a chill rushes into the cavern, and the lights seem to fade, and then a terrible voice sounds, from everywhere, all at once;

(I. GAVE. YOU. **ONE.** RULE.)


	90. Shit, Shitter Yet Shitter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Recommended listening for this chapter.](http://youtu.be/RQz1Ilgy4IQ)

“oh.” Sans says. “shit.” Your heart plummets, and you can’t help it, you think of video games, just like you had when you’d discovered your ability to pause. You think of boss fights. You’d thought you’d just finished your boss fight. 

You were beginning to suspect you were mistaken. 

“What the... _fuck_ was that even!?” Capra demands.

“...I’ve heard that voice before.” Undyne whispers, looking confused and worried. Paula, by her side, makes a hopeless sounding moan. 

You let Doris’ limp body drop to the ground, and you shuffle away, trying to get something solid at your back. The room was already dim, the edges of the cavern almost black, because there was only so much you could do to light a space this size, and even the lava carpeting the center of the room (magma? You swore to yourself that if you ever managed to see the light of day again, if you ever got out of this hell, that you were going to learn the goddamn difference…) and the massive circular lights bolted to the ceiling could do so little to penetrate the darkness that belonged in places this far removed from the sun. 

But now, between those massive shafts of light trying so valiantly to part the blackness, something was gathering. The dark was growing darker, pooling together into…

(ONE. SINGLE. RULE.) Gaster’s voice echoes around the cavern with the precision of a finely tuned watch. Click. Click. Click. (I told you two. I told you. You could do anything you wanted. Anything in my kingdom was yours, but this one, tiny, **singular** thing.) Oh god. In the center of the room, a pillar is roiling, forming, a pitch black core in the center of the room that no light could ever, ever penetrate. 

“Okay, but what the fuck.” Capra tries again, but his voice is weaker this time, staring up at the pillar, as the blackness forms, drifts… oh god. It’s landing directly on that stupid little stage. Of course it is. 

Plenty of the people in black that you’ve captured, those assholes that were trying to kill you such a short time ago, plenty of them are still conscious, and you didn’t have enough time to gag all of them, of course. The sound of screams begins to fill the room as those humans still alert enough to process the new horror in this room start to panic. 

(Oh… that is **distracting.** ) Gaster’s voice hisses, and you can see, just barely in the gathering darkness, _something_ open and shut, directly underneath your hundreds of captives, and then… well, the screaming stops. 

“dad. stop.” Sans says, loudly enough that his voice echoes around the cavern. “we were going to die! you had to have seen that! we were going to die!”

(You die ALL THE TIME!) Gaster roars, and if Sans’ voice had echoed before, this tone, so deep, so monstrously loud, makes you want to cringe, hide your head between your hands and wait for your eardrums to stop ringing. You don’t. You stand up straight. 

“He’s your son!” You bark out, your voice hoarse and exhausted. 

“Sans has a dad?” Capra asks nobody in particular. The room is so dim that you can barely see him now, even though he’s only a few feet from you. Anything that’s not in those bright beams of light is barely discernable. You can no longer see Sans or Undyne, and you can’t stand to think too hard about that.

(AND YOU.) Gaster hisses, and improbably, from the center of that pillar of darkness, there’s a sound of a throat clearing. (You tiny little… nothing, you pathetic little pile of insignificant atoms, I’ve seen your beginning and end so! MANY! TIMES!) The pillar flares, but it’s not with light. It’s with the exact opposite of light. One of the fluorescent beams falters, then fades into nothing. (I even saved you! I snatched you from the void, I stopped you from falling into the pieces your body so desperately wants to be, and this is how you return my favor? I had. One. Tiny. Rule.) 

The cavern echoes with clicks. 

“I didn’t mean to. I don’t even know how I did it.” You try, attempting, begging. Could you cut your way out of this? Could you slice a door and jump through?

But no. If you made a doorway, Gaster could follow. That was the only thing you knew for sure that Sans’ father could do, but the events of the last few minutes had made that heartstoppingly clear.

(You ssssstole from me.) Gaster hisses, sounding furious and patronizing all at once. (You nasty little pissant-t-t-t.)

“dad.” Sans’ voice sounds weak, like he understands the futility of reasoning with his father but like he still feels that he needs to try anyway. “she didn’t steal. it’s just-”

(Just Eve picking the goddamn apple and deciding to take a bite.) Gaster snarls. (You could have been happy, son. You both could have. I gave you all of this, just as long as you didn’t fuck with it. But… human nature. I should have **KNOWN** something like you would be entirely unable to keep your grubby little hands off the one thing you were told you couldn’t have! That’s what humans… do.) He whispers, the hissing sound filling the room as he makes his utter disappointment known. (And now I have to punish you.)

“dad. no.” Sans sounds firmer. “you don’t need to do any of this.”

(You were always like this, son.) Gaster says wearily. (Pitched a fit every single time I took a toy away. Not that you ever deserved them in the first place, you worthless… ingrate.) The darkness pulses again, gathering. 

“why does it even matter?” You jump, feeling something brush against you, but then you realize, with relief, that it’s Sans. He’s found his way to you through the maze of darkness, and he’s positioning himself between you and Gaster, like that could somehow make a difference. Oh, god, your heart aches. You’re not ready to say goodbye to him. You’d just gotten accustomed to the fact that you were both going to live, to really live, that the nightmare was over, and now… “she’ll never do it again. she’ll never need to.” 

(I often reflect upon how glad I am that you aren’t my own flesh and blood, Sans. This must truly be proof of the importance of nature, as opposed to nurture.) Gaster suddenly lets out a wild, uncontained laugh, and the clicking in between the gulps and peals of laughter feels like a thousand insects are attempting to bore into your brain. (You squandered your potential, you idiot. You could have been a true sssscientist! But, no. It was always tending for others. You worked at a ...hot dog stand. Someone with your education worked at a hot dog stand, just so you could kkeeppp your broken little brother out of my sight.) He takes a breath. (I do believe I’ll visit him next, once we’re done here. You’ve done me the favor of leaving so many pathways into your home.)

“Please. Don’t.” You say, just as, on the other side of the room, you hear Undyne roar, 

“If you touch any of them, I’ll-”

(TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTION!) Gaster booms, cutting off any objection. (Why does it matter, Sans? It matters because time was crisp and clean and orderly and laid out before me, and I was content, I was pleased, a weaver at my loom, watching the timelines twist in and out, exercising my d-d-dominion over all of it! OVER IT ALL!) He roars again, and lets out another burst of laughter. (And then your pet, she… how do I explain this so that you can understand what she’s done?” He whispers, and for a moment, he sounds genuinely confused. Then; (Ah. Yes. This is crude enough to do. Your brother has an automobile, correct? And you’ve gone driving with him. So you’ll understand. Your pet human there, she’s a bird, and she just **SHAT ON MY WINDSHIELD.** ) 

Again, the room fills with deafening laughter, but this time, underneath the unhinged hilarity, you can hear the menace practically dripping from each individual “HA.” Just as abruptly as it begins, it stops. 

(I don’t enjoy not being able to see. I don’t enjoy your human spoiling the complexity of my c-cc-creation.) He clicks, almost silently this time. Your ringing ears have to strain to hear him. 

“you fixed it before, right?” Sans sounds like he’s almost begging. “this doesn’t have to be a thing, dad. you don’t need to.”

(Oh. But I do.) Gaster laughs again. (No talking your way out of this one now, son. You. Are. Grounded.)

“you can’t even do anything. we can just leave. you’re not even really here.” Sans spits, and Gaster bursts out laughing, wilder than you’ve heard him yet. 

(Son. You are so unbelievabllllllllly ssssstupid.) He clicks out. (Three minutes ago, I wasn’t really here. Moving from the fourth dimension to the third takes **work**. It is **painful.** But it can be done. With time.) He sighs reproachfully, and whispers, (Ttttthis-s-s is why you don’t let your opponent-t-t-t-t _monologue._ )

The cavern is pitch black now, except for those shafts of light, and the darkness around you pulses one last time, before it shatters. It explodes, from the darkest point on the stage, and all the light that had been filtering away into nothing radiates like a wave, practically blinding you - for a moment, all you can see is the swimming afterimages of purple and green, your vision swirling and practically indistinguishable regardless of if your eyes are opened or closed. It takes another few minutes for you to make out what’s happening, but in that time, Sans - who doesn’t seem to be sharing your problem - has moved back against you, shielding you bodily, blocking you from… 

On that stupid little wooden stage, where Doris had stood just hours - no, minutes - ago, another figure has formed, a tall, elegant looking skeleton. Not a human skeleton. No human has ever looked like this, with their bones all tapering off into sharp points, into claws that make you think of, fuck, of Jurassic Park, of crabs, of cockroaches… and then there is his skull, a crack running through it from cranium to mandible, clipping through one of his eye sockets. There is no light in those eyes. 

He is not wearing any clothes, but somehow, while that might seem obscene if Sans was in his position, this fact is simply… menacing. Clothes would make a being like this seem ridiculous, like a bear dressed in business attire. But still, he stands there, looking paternal and faintly amused, a father about to put his squalling infant in timeout. 

(Oh.) He breathes. (It has been so long since I felt… Oh goodness.) 

“dad. please.” Sans whispers again, and you can feel him, pressed against you, and you can only hope, somehow, that this isn’t the last time you’ll feel him. 

The odds aren’t looking very good right now. 

“Oh, fuck this.” Capra’s voice startles you, and you realize instantly that while you’d been standing, nearly incapacitated with shock and exhaustion and fear, Capra, that glorious idiot, had been sidling along the edges of the room, in between the beams of light, approaching that stage. “Christ, you’re a shitty dad!”

“peter, don’t!-” Sans yells out, but it’s too late. Capra rushes the stage, rushes Gaster, yelling;

“Well, I’ve got some _father issues to work out!_ ”

Gaster doesn’t even turn his head. He just reaches out, moves at last, and at once both you and Capra understand the enormity of his mistake. 

If you look at a cube head on, it looks like it’s just a square. You’d been seeing Gaster as he stood, totally still, but now that he’d shifted, oh god. Oh god. 

It seemed that you couldn’t spend an endless eternity in the fourth dimension without it… growing on you. 

So many arms shoot out, all at once, from that tall and elegant form, and as he turns, as he lashes out at Capra, you see it all, you see how far he extends into space he shouldn’t be able to occupy - oh, god, that’s at least eight arms, eight legs, four? depending on the angle, it had to be four heads, and so many, so many claws slash at Capra, catching him - oh god, at least one rakes over his face, you see that clearly before he’s sent flying like he weighs nothing at all, soaring through the air before he hits a boulder and crumples. 

He doesn’t get back up. 

(S-s-s-son.) Gaster’s heads whisper, as his body spools out into infinity, into a space that hurts your brain, (You really need to pick your friends more carefully.)

“fuck!” Sans whispers, pressing more firmly against you as he inches back, holding his arms out a tiny bit, like that matters, like that’ll stop his father, but it doesn’t seem to mean a single thing to Gaster. So many eyes blink at you as he twists, and then, hideously, he begins to … to scuttle towards you, sliding off that wooden platform and lurching toward you like something just learning how to walk. This seems to be novel for Gaster, because, again, he begins to laugh wildly. 

“Undyne!” You yell out. God, she’s not part of this. She needs to - “Find Alphys, get out of here!”

“_______!” She yells back, still on the other side of the cavern.

“go!” Sans agrees, breathing hard - you can feel his ribs rise and fall with each breath as he presses against you, trying so desperately to stay in the way. Undyne holds still for a long moment as Gaster inches closer and Sans tries so desperately to think of something and you, you reach for a spear and you find _nothing_ because you are just out of magic, and then she turns and runs through the door that Paula had been brought through, and-

And Paula, who you’d forgotten about, speaks up. 

“You’re not going to touch my niece.” She says, shakily but insistent, and around her, debris begins to lift off the ground, first rocks, then boulders, stalagmites - or were they stalactites? Add that to the list of things you’ll figure out if you manage, somehow, to survive this. Gaster turns his heads, looking bemusedly at this new human. 

(Ah. I’d already forgotten you.) He says, and Paula roars, something terrible and animal coming out of that bloodstained mouth, and what has to be literal tons of stone come rushing at Gaster and it -

It slides through him, it doesn’t even hit him, and Gaster is everywhere and nowhere all at once, and he’s laughing so hard he’s wheezing now, and he scuttles towards Paula instead, gasping, (Oh! Oh! You’ve shown me yours, now let me show you mine!)

“________, run! RUN!” Paula screams, and your muscles tense to do so, just before a bony appendage snatches her, reaching out an impossible distance, and still cackling, Gaster throws her -

Oh god. 

You should be running, you should be trying, you should be doing something, but you’re frozen, and all you can do is scream as Paula’s body falls into the pool of lava in the center of the room. The sight is, thankfully, obscured from your view by the melted turbine prototype, by the wooden stage, but those things can’t hide her screams. 

They only last for a few seconds, before Paula falls silent for the last time. 

(Now.) Gaster is almost weeping with laughter, and he is crouched like a spider, a scorpion, a terrible creeping thing, and he begins to scuttle up the wall of the cavern, his heads swiveling to face you. (Time for the main course.)


	91. Skarmageddon

“dad. gaster. last chance.” Sans’ voice is stronger than you can really believe - you feel like your own can barely be trusted to squeak right now. Paula is… dead, Capra still hasn’t moved from where he was thrown, Undyne is gone, and -

Gaster pauses in his scrabbling, and one, three heads spin-

(T-t-t-there you are. Oh this s-s-space is…. ssssstrange! How do you s-s-s-stand these limitations?) Gaster rasps, and lets out another wild peal of laughter. Something is dripping from one of his mouths, a thick, black, viscous liquid, something that splatters onto the ground, which immediately begins to hiss and disintegrate. 

“acid spit. course he has acid spit. why the fuck wouldn’t he.” Sans mutters under his breath, then growls. “well, fuck this.” He reaches out, and for a second, you think that Gaster’s body jerks, but then he bursts out laughing, skittering along the wall towards you at an insane angle. 

(Gravity magic? Son, I GAVE that to you. I shaped you! I MADE YOU. You were a pile of useless bones when I found you, until I gave you your gifts, and now you use them a-g-g-g-g-ainst me? ME!) He begins to boom with laughter, stopping his progress to clutch at his sides with too many hands, as if the thought is too hilarious - he teeters, and slides from the wall into a disorganized pile of bones on the ground, still shaking with laughter. 

(Ah. Kids.) He finally whispers. (You never know what they’ll do next.)

Sans lets out a low, furious growl, and again, you try to snatch for some kind of magic, _something_ , and you reach for a spear again, and something shudders to life in your hand at last, the last tiny representation of your power, a short spear barely the length of your arm.

It’s still something. You hold onto it with your right hand until you can barely tell where the bones of your hand stop and the bone of the spear begins, shaking with the effort. You’ll get one shot. If that. You need to time this right. 

Sans must have seen what you’ve done, because he peels away from you, just a tiny bit, just enough that you can move if necessary, and in that moment, you love him more than you could have thought possible. You’d truly chosen a partner in all things, someone who was legitimately your other half, who could tell what you were thinking before even you were sure. Even though he was probably thinking that this was futile (you certainly were), he’d give you the chance to attack. 

“on three.” He whispers, so low you can barely hear him. “i love you, babe. i’m so sorry.” 

“Not your fault. Love you too.” You breathe.

“one. two. three-”

With an enormous amount of exertion, you pull yourself into that state of alertness, preparing for the imminent attack. For a second, you panic as you discover that Gaster’s soul is nowhere to be seen, but then, oh, you realize, even as your vision has dimmed just to search for souls, that there is a place in that pile of bones that is blacker, that is the exact opposite of light, a perfect two dimensional heart, a black hole-

Silently, at once, you and Sans attack. You’ve never seen Sans unleash his full potential for destruction before - you’ve never had a reason! - but now, as the floor erupts with bones, a rolling wave surging forward across the cavern to tangle with the twitching, laughing heap that is Gaster… at last, now, you understand why he’d tried to warn you off him so long ago, why he’d been so deliberate about cautioning you that he had the potential to be dangerous. The _force_ of his attack is tangible, visceral; you feel it all through you like a shockwave, but you don’t have time to think about that, because you’re throwing that short spear at Gaster with all the strength you have left. 

Improbably, it strikes - you can feel it, and for a second, you want to crow out in relief, seeing that spear flying through the air, twisting through Sans’ bone attack, to stick, trembling, into that pitch black soul, where it…

Dissolves. 

Your spear is torn apart just as neatly as your arm had been all those months ago; the individual molecules comprising it convulse and decide, one by one, that they no longer have any interest in being a spear. Gaster watches on, bemused, as you realize that, as far as you know, there’s no way to land a blow on him. 

(Very well.) Gaster sighs, and suddenly, in a heartbeat, a motion too fast for you to track with your eyes, that pile of twitching, cackling bone has reassembled itself into the terrible spider form, the creature extending too far in every single direction. (I see you’re in a rush to get this over with.)

“fuck.” Sans whispers, and he tries again - this time, there are even more bones, his attack is even more powerful and the cavern erupts, the floor beneath Gaster, the ceiling above him, the wall, all bristling with jagged ivory like a mouth with thousands and thousands of teeth, like a lamprey-

(They s-s-s-s-s-say **insanity** is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, son!) Gaster calls out merrily. (Goodness gracious. And you call yourself a scientist! I really will have to kill both of you, won’t I?) He pays absolutely no heed to the bones littering his path, the bones that should have torn him apart. He just continues, deliberately, towards you.

“He’s here though.” You whisper, your heart plummeting as Sans inches backwards, as one of his hands moves to hold onto yours - is he getting ready to teleport? Does he really think that will help? Wherever you go, no matter what, this nightmare will be able to follow. 

Maybe he’s just saying goodbye. 

“He’s here.” You breathe again. “He’s in this dimension. We’ve got to be able to touch him somehow…”

(Now. There’s a s-s-s-s-s-smart girllll.) Gaster screeches. (Which r-r-r-r-reminds me. No wedding invitation for your **father?** ) Sans can’t help it. He bursts out laughing at the absolute absurdity, though his laughs sound forced, deliberate -

Oh thank god, you knew what it meant when he laughed like that. You’d heard it before, only joking, of course, but you knew that sound because you knew him down to his core. You loved this man, and so you are filled with absolute relief as you process what’s happening. He’s planning something. 

“dad.” He finally forces out. “you’re trying to kill us. wedding’s kind of-”

(I am **in the process of** k-k-killing you.) Gaster corrects, then sighs. (No matter. I’ll ask one of the other sets of you, in one of the timelines where your pet has learned to **obey**. And if you fail to give me a satisfactory answer in that timeline, I might just kill you there too, son!) He spits, and again, begins shaking with mirth, crawling forward once more - god, he’s close enough now, you could have hit him with a spear even without magic, that’s barely twenty feet...

“no. i don’t think so.” Sans growls, and he makes one more gesture. “i think you’re done. i think you forgot what it was like to be down here with the rest of us. think you forgot that people can get hurt down here.” It takes you a second to realize what he’s done, because part of you is dizzy and lost with distraction and fear and the thought that this might be the last time you feel his hand in yours. You try to think about the fact that Gaster had as much as told you that you would continue to survive in other timelines, other realities, but it turns out that this isn’t much of a consolation at all - oh _______, stop and concentrate for once, this is the one time you can’t panic!

“and you know what, gaster?” Sans barks, and you realize at last what he’s done. “now that you’re down here, ’s time you started living by the same rules as the rest of us!” In the darkness of the cavern, Sans has cut a doorway, one larger than you’d ever, ever seen, and you hear a familiar keening in your brain, and one by one, they’re coming. The first massive skull floats out, as big as a damn elephant, and Sans tears his attention from Gaster, from you, to grin dangerously at the enormous, hovering creature for a split second. 

He’d told you so long ago, that just like you had your favorite Blaster, so did he.

More and more are coming now, more Blasters than you knew were even out there, all following the massive Alpha Blaster that’s floated to Sans’ other side; Sans squeezes your hand, and the two of you are moving so the cave wall is no longer at your back. No, now you’ve got something greater at your back, something much more impressive, the gathering host, the, fuck, the swarm of Blasters. There’s a feeling in the air of gathering power, of magic, there’s a charging that you’d only felt once before, and Gaster is-

He is making a choked noise that takes you a minute to identify as absolutely hysterical laughter. 

( **S-S-S-SO! S-S-S-S-S-STUPID!** ) Gaster bellows, and one of his heads, at least, it’s _weeping_ toxic black tears that spatter to the ground and hiss as he just marvels at the hilarity of the situation. (You’re as much of an imbecile as… as… as **Papyrus!** ) He screams, overjoyed. (I will not suffer such a fool to live! You’ve learned NOTHING today!) He crows, and all of his heads shake reproachfully. (Your pet there. Its proper name. A **G-G--G---GASTER BLASTER!** ) He sings out, then makes a soft clicking noise. 

The enormous blaster at Sans’ side turns to study him out of inscrutably deep eye sockets, and Sans’ stubborn, furious smile slips.

“no, buddy.” He breathes. “c’mon. c’mon. stay right here. s’okay. good boy. good boy, you’re-”

Gaster clicks again, and the skull hovering next to Sans lets out a pitiful, sorrowful whine, but then… oh, god, it begins to drift across the cavern, and as it moves, the thirty, forty-odd blasters that had been assembling behind their alpha, they begin to keen to each other, and then… oh, fuck, one by one, they follow, assembling their massive presence behind Gaster as he quivers with hysterical laughter. 

“nonononono…” Sans rasps, watching each weapon deserting the two of you, and you want to hold him, want to weep. 

(EVERYTHING YOU ARE, I GAVE YOU!) Gaster cackles. (EVERYTHING YOU HAVE, I CAN TAKE AWAY! YOU ARE NOTHING! YOU ARE AN INVENTION THAT I SHOULD HAVE MARKED AS A FAILURE FROM DAY ONE! YOU. ARE. WORTHLESS.) He screams. (AND THESE ARE - wait.) Suddenly, he sounds quite out of sorts. (What the hell do you think **_you’re_** doing?)

There’s a furious scream from behind you, and you realize, all at once, that not every blaster had deserted you after all. 

Spot presses against you, just for a second, the same reassuring nuzzle she always did, and then, facing Gaster, facing dozens of her brothers and sisters, she prepares to take her last stand, her jaw dropping open, the wild sensation of energy gathering-

(YOU DARE! YOU DARE DEFY ME!) Gaster scrabbles forward, but he’s forgotten you entirely now, his focus entirely on Spot. (YOU ARE MINE! I DISCOVERED YOUR KIND! I TRAINED YOU TO SERVE ME! YOU ARE M-M-M-MINNNNNNNEEE-) 

“babe.” Sans whispers, and you feel him falling to a crouch, dropping your hand, and you know what he must be thinking, that Gaster’s in striking distance, that this is his last chance to maybe, somehow, deal a blow. “always love you.” He breathes, under the sound of Gaster’s furious tantrum. 

And you are just not ready to let go of him. Not now, not ever. With the audience of all those blasters, all those creatures watching curiously, with the feeling of Spot at your back and the man you love by your side, you know at last what to do. You recognize at last what you’d been missing all this time. 

Gaster had four heads. Eight legs. More ribcages, more ribs than any being could possibly justify, more of _everything_ than you could even wrap your mind around. Except - 

In the center of that mess, he had one soul. Just one. 

You remember Undyne’s surprise, her instant recoil when she had learned just how early in your relationship you’d permitted Sans to touch your soul. You remember, just barely, just a scrap of memory, something between her and Sans, something about how dangerous, how idiotic that had been, how much you could have been hurt, because souls were something precious, fragile, _private_...

And as Gaster looms over you, roaring his fury at Spot, as Sans crouches for one last ditch attack, you realize that you have this one, singular opportunity. 

You reach out with your right arm, feeling like the world around you is moving in slow motion - maybe it is, Sans still hasn’t struck out at his father, has barely moved - and you tug with your mind at Gaster’s soul. It comes free, comes sailing towards you with almost no resistance. Of course it does. You’re out of magic, out of borrowed magic anyway, but there is one thing that you are innately gifted at, one thing that your father had passed down to you, that you can’t run out of. Furiously, with more determination than you can ever remember having, you reach out, and you grab a hold of that pitch black soul, and Gaster lets out a hideous scream, falling short from whatever he’d been about to do to Spot. 

And you don’t lash out, no, you press your bony fingertips as hard into his soul as you possibly can, and you draw in, because you are. _A. Goddamned. Sponge._

You are doing what sponges do best. You are absorbing. 

Gaster’s shrieks grow more and more unhinged as you feel his magic rushing into you, as you strip him, layer by layer, of all the power that he’s gathered to himself, of everything, and it’s almost too much, it’s more magic than you’ve ever had a grasp of, and it’s wrong, it’s not like Sans’ at all, but it’s familiar, it’s what you feel when you touch that black disk delineating flesh from bone on your right arm, but now it’s all through you and it’s painful, how powerful it is, but you have to keep gathering it in….

Sans snarls, something between fury and ferocious, beautiful pride in that noise, and bones burst from the floor and ceiling once again, but as you clutch onto Gaster’s soul, this time, they strike home. Gaster’s body begins to splinter, to crack, and you can feel the magic ebbing from his soul, and it _hurts_ , fuck, fuck, it hurts so terribly, you didn’t know anything could hurt this much! You are clinging to an electric fence, you are a willing conduit to a resource you should never have access to, but you need to do this, for Sans, Spot, Papyrus, fuck, for everyone, the entire world, the entire universe, so you scream and you _pull_ the last of Gaster’s magic into you, and the terrible being looming over you crumbles. 

Cracks spread over every inch of exposed bone - they spiderweb over Gaster, and then, at once, he shatters, and that enormous body-that-should-not-be explodes into dust. And it is just you and the entire universe of Gaster’s magic inside you, and you begin to tremble, trying to hang on.

“________.” Sans whispers your name, and you feel his hands on your shoulders. You realize that you’d begun to drift off the floor. 

“S-s-so muccch….” You hear yourself rasp, and Sans’ grip grows just a little tighter. 

“stay with me.” He breathes. “c’mon. c’mon babe. you can do this.” His voice sounds thick - are those tears in his eyesockets? You can barely see, the blackness of the magic you’d just absorbed is filling your vision.

“S-s-s-s-sans…” You whisper, and you suspect you’re crying too. It’s too much, it’s too much, it’s going to tear you apart….

“stay. i love you. you promised. you gotta stay.” He whispers, the feeling of his hands on your shoulders the only thing keeping you focused. “said you’d stay with me forever. gotta… gotta keep your promise.” He’s so choked, and you know he’s crying, even if you can’t see him anymore. 

Even if you’re seeing, in that pitching, rolling blackness, something no human should be able to see. Thousands of timelines, thousands of… deaths, hundreds and thousands of times that you’d lost him, or he’d lost you, and…

You are determined that it will not happen again. 

“Let go.” You whisper. “I just need to… I can do this.” Sans inhales sharply at that request, and for a second, it seems like he’ll refuse, but then the pressure of his hands leaves your shoulders, and you feel yourself drifting upwards, suspended in space, in time, and you’ve got all this magic coiled in you like a spring, and you know what you need to do.

Oh god, so much power, this could corrupt anyone, but you, you just need to use it, you just need it gone - you flex the magic around you experimentally, ignoring the screaming pain, and then you lash out with it and -

You open a door to somewhere that isn’t the void, that is so far beyond the void, somewhere dark, darker… yet darker. And with an enormous amount of concentrated exertion, you pluck the hundreds of screaming human souls from that wretched, nightmare space, and you pull them back here, your assailants, the people who’d tried to kill you just minutes (hours) ago, you bring them all home, and with the last amount of coiled power inside you, you shove that door shut again. 

The blackness fades from your eyes just as you see Undyne and Alphys bursting through that ridiculously marked staircase out of this cavernous hell, the red light of the “Exit” sign flickering over them as the men and women, humans and monsters come rushing in behind them - Asgore, you see Asgore, and you see human police officers, and then your feet touch ground again, and then all you can see or feel or care about is Sans, who is sobbing, who is wrapping his arms around you.

And you kiss him, and you cling to him, and it dawns on you, by degrees, that you have both survived. 

You have never seen anything more beautiful than the expression on his face as he realizes the same thing. 

“Okay, that-” the soft, pained voice of Peter Capra sounds, several feet from you, “was pretty batshit.” 

“capra! you’re-”

“Needing a hospital _pretty_ bad right now, thanksss…” Capra manages, and you can see him shift, bloody and mangled at the base of the boulder Gaster had flung him into. 

“We need a medic!” You yell out, as more and more humans and monsters rush into the space, and you can see two men with a board rushing towards you - thank god, they’re EMTs - and then Undyne is by your side with Alphys, and you begin weeping again, feeling so weak, so thankful, but Sans has you. He’s holding you so tight that you can’t even collapse, and you even manage a weak laugh of relief, clutching him and feeling delirious with shock and horror and gratitude, thankfulness that this isn’t how it ends. 

“we won.” Sans whispers; his face is buried in your hair, his mouth somewhere near your ear. 

“We won.” You echo, shaking and crying and laughing, and Undyne and Alphys are crying too. 

“Fuck yeah we did.” Capra croaks, as the medics begin to hurry him out, and even though you know people will need to talk to you, you pull away from Sans enough to grab his sleeve and mutter,

“Doorway.” 

“i love you.” Sans whispers, and then he reaches out and makes a big, big doorway - it’ll be getting a lot of use tonight - directly to the front door of the local hospital. “guys, through here.” The EMTs look at the doorway with bewildered expressions for only a moment before they accept the boon for what it is and begin carrying Capra, the first of the wounded, through. Wordlessly, you reach for Undyne’s wrist, still clinging to Sans with your other hand - Undyne is holding onto Alphys as well, and so you all probably look slightly insane as you tug them all through, after the medics and Capra and-

And it is a warm April night, and you are outside, and those are the stars. And there are a thousand, thousand things left to do, a thousand things to take care of, but for right now…

You’re all alive. The sky is above you, your soulmate is by your side with your best friends, and the horror is over, and for right now, that’s enough.


	92. In Which Everyone Chills Out

“babe. time to get up.” 

“Nooooooooooo. No. No. No. Sans. No.” Okay, you’re pitching a fit, hiding your head under your pillow, doing everything you possibly can to protest, but it’s two days after, like, _everyone_ had tried to kill you, and you’d _finally_ gotten to sleep the entire night through without the human government or Asgore needing something from either of you, and you just didn’t _care_ that it was nearly eleven in the morning, because-

“mmm, fine, capra can learn the hard way that nobody loves him enough to visit him.” Sans says placidly. You look up from the hiding spot you’d been making under your pillow. 

“He can have visitors at last!?” You exclaim, and Sans laughs. 

“mhm. hospital just called. i mean, no rush, just-”

“We’re going.” You cut off any words he might have to make the trip seem less urgent. You’ve been living with an absolutely obscene amount of guilt, thinking about what had happened to Capra, and worse, what you’d suspected of Capra. It had made the last forty-eight hours even tougher than necessary, and, well… they’d been tough, guilt notwithstanding. 

\--------------------------------

It had taken a while for you to find Doris, when you gathered the strength to step back through into that nightmare place. She was so small, so slight - and so goddamn crafty, that she’d managed to crawl all the way to the elevator doors by the time someone noticed her. 

“You’re, uh, sure that she’s behind this?” One of the cops had asked, looking at the tiny old woman with the spectacular bruise on her face. “I mean, looks like the only crime she’d commit would be like, givin’ you an oatmeal raisin cookie and sayin’ it’s chocolate ch-”

“pretty fucking sure.” Sans had growled, his grip on your hand tightening - he hadn’t let you go in the last hour, and he didn’t seem likely to start now. “you need me to get get the security footage myself, bud, capra’s got this place totally wired and i have no problem-”

“Okay, okay!” The cop held up his hands, and radioed in, “We need an escort for, uh, a old lady down at -”

“Sans.” Suddenly Asgore loomed in front of you. You swayed wearily, squinting up at the king. “_______.” He added, after a long moment, and reached down to put a steadying paw on your shoulder. Apparently bygones were bygones now, since the truth had, at last, all come out. You had wanted to work up the energy to be insulted, but it was still too much to do anything but keep that one thought cycling endlessly through your head ( _you’d survived, you got the chance to live, to have that full life you’d promised each other_ ). “You both need to see…” He nodded to the pile of shattered bones that had once been Sans’ father, and you grimaced. The two of you had been avoiding that spot quite deliberately, without saying a word, too busy giving your reports and…

Two Royal Guards were fishing something out of the wreckage of bone and pitch black viscera. Something - someone - slightly taller than you, someone humanoid-

“no.” Sans whispered, his grip on your hand growing almost painful.

“...He survived. Er. Or, so it appears, in any event. He has yet to wake, but it seems he has returned to his old form, the one he occupied before he disappeared, but…” The king trailed off, and he studied you for a long moment before continuing. “But his soul has been entirely sapped. It is... colorless.” Asgore said. 

“y’mean black, it already was that-” Sans began, but Asgore shook his head. 

“Colorless. Like plate glass.” He said, and Sans grimaced, perhaps as unsure as you were about how to parse that news. “If he wakes… and it is uncertain that he will, but he should not pose any further threat. He is without magic.” The king continued quietly, and your throat felt, just for a moment, like it was closing up, particularly when the massive monster in front of you turned his regal regard to you, just… watching you for a moment. “It seems that this is a gift we were unaware humans could possess.” He said slowly. “To sap a monster of magic simply by touching-”

“asgore.” Sans hissed defensively, and the king cleared his throat. 

“Naturally, it was necessary.” He said quietly. “And I know ________, that you will neither abuse this gift, nor make this ability widely known. In the wrong hands, I fear that it poses-”

“Course I won’t tell anyone, Asgore.” You said weakly, rubbing your eye. “You’re… you know. You’re all my people, I’d never do anything to put you at risk-”

“she volunteered to _die_ rather than see us put back underground, ass-” Sans had already began to work him up to a fever pitch, not that you entirely blamed him; he was still braced for the next attack against you, which you doubted would stop anytime soon. 

“Sans.” You managed to cut his rant off, leaning against his shoulder and yawning, and at last, Asgore had looked sympathetically at the two of you. 

“You truly have been through hell this night, I fear.” He breathed, then shook his head. “Alphys was able to lead us to the other captives. Monsters that have been missing for _months_ will be returned home to their families this night, as soon as our healers are done with their duties. Your father-”

“s’not my father. just some dickhead-”

“Dr. Gaster, then, will be brought down to the prison cells beneath the palace. If he ever recovers, he should not expect to leave that place.” Asgore assured you, then sighed. “There will be time for all of this later. You have saved so many lives this night. Go home. Rest.” You and Sans had looked uncertainly at each other. “It’s over.” Asgore murmured after a moment, seeing your hesitation. 

“It’s over.” You’d repeated, after a moment. 

\-------------------------------------

Of course, it hadn’t been over, not really. You’d come home, ready to sleep, only to discover the most raucous party of all time, with the (thankfully) unharmed Alphys and Undyne at the epicenter. You’d find out later that the planned guests for the bachelorette parties had arrived in a trickle over the course of the night, the tension growing thicker and thicker even as Papyrus (and later Mettaton) had done their very best to keep the mood calm. When Undyne and Alphys had stepped out of a shortcut back home, just a half hour before you and Sans, the place had erupted into relieved, celebratory chaos, and now your home was just a minefield of anime, alcohol and dicks. 

You’d been unable to resist it - somehow, in spite of the hell you’d been through, it was still only nine at night! - and you’d allowed yourself (and Sans, who was not letting go of you) to celebrate the sheer joy that none of you were going to die this night. Relief did funny things to people, you couldn’t help but notice. You’d never laughed harder, or been on the verge of tears so often, as you were that night. 

“I love the whole world.” You’d whispered to Sans, very late at night, and he had merely grinned that big, relieved, disbelieving grin and hugged you closer. 

“me too.” He’d murmured, then burst out laughing. “just hope you’re in this good a mood tomorrow when you see how many thing’s spot’s already accidentally smashed since you let her in here-”

“Hey, she’s allowed inside!” You’d protested instantly, ready to jump to her defense, and he’d beamed at you, reaching down to scoop up Ghost and pet the kitty distractedly.

“too nice. world’s gonna eat you up, et cetera.” You’d grinned at him, at that. 

“Mmm, just let it fucking try.”

\--------------------------------------------------

“Oh, thank god you’re here, I was getting so bored.” Capra is in… _rough_ shape. Well, that’s putting it lightly. His right arm is in a cast and a sling, and the left one has an IV taped into it, attached to some fairly noxious looking bags of… something, attached to a pole. His leg, sticking out from under the white hospital blankets, is similarly wrapped in plaster. And his face…

His right eye has a cotton bandage taped to it, and in between the bruising mottling his skin, there’s a stitched up wound, a gash extending from just above the right corner of his mouth, up and through that cotton bandage, then his eyebrow, finally terminating an inch or so into his hairline. The doctors must have had to shave a neat square into his hair in order to be able to stitch properly. You sincerely hope that Capra hadn’t been awake for that part - that just seems too cruel. 

“bud, we came as soon as we could.” Sans assures him, grimacing. “but… uh, you sure you’re up for visitors?”

“You kidding me?” Capra nods at the TV in the corner of his hospital room, where Wheel of Fortune is playing. “Look at this shit. This is what I’ve had to work with for two days.” A new puzzle pops onto the screen and Capra just glances at it, before solving the puzzle, “It’s ‘Better Late Than Never.’” He supplies. You look, dumbfounded, at the screen. Nobody’s even guessed a letter yet. 

“Jeez. Why aren’t you doing that instead of CEOing?” You demand, and he barks out a laugh. 

“I like CEOing.” He says, then glares at you - for a second anyway, before he winces and says, “Ah, fuck, that hurts.”

“what’s the damage, bud?” Sans interjects. Capra exhales slowly. 

“Broken arm - like, five places broken. Three broken ribs. Fractured tibia. Miscellaneous bruising. Don’t get me started on my face.”

“Your eye-”

“Doc says I can probably keep it, but they had to do something with lasers and, uh, you know, I’m not allowed to use it for a while.” Capra grimaces. “Could be worse. Still breathing. Sans, your dad is a real dick, you know that?” He says, his face twisting into a sardonic grin. Sans bursts out laughing, not a little bitterly, and nods. 

“yeah, sure is.” He mutters. You’re busily counting up all those wounds, and feeling honestly relieved that it wasn’t worse for Capra - you’d watched the security tapes a dozen times now, giving testimony to the human and monster authorities, and you’d seen what had happened to Capra enough times to feel just horrified by it; Gaster had thrown him across the room by his _face_...

“Anyway, ________, you dick, you thought it was _me?_ ” Capra suddenly snaps, one blue eye focusing blearily on you. 

“Uh, yeah. How did you-”

“Papyrus texted me, apologizing!” Capra says, fully grumpy. 

“uh. you and paps text?”

“Do not change the subject.” Capra threatens half heartedly. “What the hell even, though, I thought we were bros!”

“We are bros!” You protest weakly. “I just found all that stuff in the supply closet and I figured-”

“That it was _me?_ ” Capra says indignantly. “Why would _I_ go in the supply closet? That’s not for me, that’s for secretaries!” Suddenly, his eye goes round and innocent. “Guys. Do you think they’re called secretaries because they keep, you know, _secrets_?” You and Sans stare at him for a second, then Sans glances up at the bags of medicine feeding into his arm. 

“is, uh, is someone keeping an eye on how much morphine they’re givin’ you-”

“It must have been a really unpleasant _supplies_!” Capra rushes to say, then snickers for a split second before he winces, holding his side gingerly. Sans slowly shakes his head, but he can’t get the incredulous grin off his face. 

“‘k, you done yellin’ at us and making… awesome puns?” He checks. “cuz we got good news.” 

“Lay it on me.” Capra is suddenly all focus. Sans elbows you, and you realize he wants you to be the one to share it. You grin slowly, savoring the moment. 

“Okay. Okay. Let me read it out.” You fish a letter out of your pocket, and clear your throat pretentiously for a moment before you begin to read. “‘In light of your bravery and selflessness during the recent events, I, Asgore Dreemur, extend the privilege of inspection and use of all electricity generating devices underground to EbbCo, so long as it is led by Peter Francis Capra-’” You stall, and grin at him, muttering, “‘Francis.’” Sans rolls his eyes, and grins at the disbelieving look on Capra’s face.

“it rambles on, but the gist is that ebbco can use the core and uh, monsters can use magic while they work for you, as long as you’re the one in charge. pretty good deal, huh? i worked for like a day to convince ‘em-”

“Holy shit.” Capra whispers. “Holy shit. What is this emotion happening in here right now.” He vaguely taps his chest, then winces. “Is this what you humans call… love?” He teases, but he can’t stop grinning, even though it hurts enough to bring tears to his good eye. “Holy shit. Holy…”

“Yeah.” You say happily. “So you gotta hurry up and get better, because you’ve got-”

“Shit to do!” Capra completes brightly, then winces again. “But wait. I’m sensing a catch. You just said ‘you’ve got shit to do.’”

“Well, actually, _you_ said that, but-”

“Why not ‘ _we’ve_ ’ got shit to do?” Capra demands, and you sigh. 

“Uh, because… with all the press and everything… the aquarium gave me my job back. Actually, they gave me Barb - my old boss’ - they gave me her job, because she’s moving up onto the board, because half the board members got arrested at EbbCo-”

“So you’re leaving me. Fine. Fine. That’s fine.” Capra pouts. This expression doesn’t seem to hurt his face, so he keeps it on. “But, what about, you know, the research? Don’t you want to know what you can do? Or, uh, what other humans might do?”

“You mean the, uh, bad book? The bad, bad book?” You ask, then shake your head. “Sans took it to Asgore. He’s got it now. So we’ll just have to trust that he knows what’s best.”

\------------------------------------

Of course, this isn’t entirely true. Asgore might have the book (“The Badbad Book” seemed to be becoming its official title), but you still had the spiral bound notebook that represented Doris’ best efforts in translating the tome. You’d been making your way through her work, bit by bit, when you could stomach it. It hadn’t been easy. Humans were truly… well, they had the potential to be truly foul creatures, sometimes. But the most disturbing thing about that spiral book hadn’t been the descriptions of what mages had done to gain power hundreds and hundreds of years ago. 

No, the most disturbing thing was that, on the last page of the notebook, you’d found an inscription, a postscript. 

“Don’t trust him.” 

This would have been slightly menacing under any set of conditions, but there was one thing that kept you going back to that page, whenever you had a second or two to think. 

The entire book had been written in Doris’ cramped, immaculate script, but that last page… that was unmistakably your own handwriting, and you can’t remember a single time that you’d been alone with the notebook and decided to be vague as all hell. 

You suspect, just a little, that this might just indicate that your life was not entirely done being interesting. 

But, well… you’re not alone. You have Sans, Undyne and Alphys, Papyrus, Mettaton, Lesser Dog… hell, even Capra. Whatever else fate has to throw at you, you’re not going to face it alone.

And if the world tries to take a bite of you, it’s gonna learn pretty damn fast that you can bite back. 

________________________  
END OF CHILL OR BE CHILLED: SKARMAGEDDON

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOO BOY GUYS   
> WE DID IT  
> BOOK ONE IS OVER  
> Let me first alleviate your fears: Book 2 is coming. Like, this time next week. And it'll be here, in this very same document, so you don't need to re-bookmark anything or worry about any of that noise. 
> 
> Here comes the whiny bit: I love to eat and to keep the lights on, and you can help me with that! If you visit my [tumblr](http://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com), you'll find that it's pretty easy to show your support, and I wish I could go into more detail, but someone once reported me to Ao3 for self-promotion even though, uh, literally everyone else does this, so I'm going to continue to be kind of vague and just say, you know, if you enjoyed this 260k word book and you want to show your love in a way that keeps me afloat, it would be spectacularly appreciated. 
> 
> Even if you can't, I just want to thank all of you for supporting me through this ridiculous endeavor. Every comment, every kudos, every goofy submission, all the [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart), every ask, hell, every page visit means more to me than I could possibly explain. I started writing CoBC in a really tough point in my life, and I've finished this insane project just as the clouds parted to reveal that the OTHER thing in my life that I worked so hard to accomplish has been accomplished. You guys kept me going through all of this, and god, we worked together and we did a hell of a thing, huh?
> 
> Let's keep it going. See you nerds next week for **Chill or Be Chilled: Even Skarmier**


	93. Wherein Our Heroes' Adventure Begins Anew

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BOOK TWO! BOOK TWO! BOOK TWO!
> 
> You guys ready? The first chapter's done earlier than I figured, so, here you go, something to tie you over until next Monday. 
> 
> ALSO THERE HAS BEEN SO MUCH [F.ART](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> Also, fuck, guys. You have all showed me so much love, and I just want to express my appreciation for all of you from the bottom of this withered old excuse for a heart. I kind of can't believe I'm committing to another book of this, but hell, I couldn't even make it a full week before I started writing again. That should tell you guys just how much I love doing this, and how much I appreciate you all. You guys keep me going - AND MAN, THANK YOU TO THOSE OF YOU WHO'VE TOSSED ME A TIP, I am so incredibly thankful that you guys are willing to help support me and this project. Like, SO thankful. 
> 
> Anyway. You guys ready? 
> 
> I think you're ready.
> 
> Hope you stayed buckled, kids, because the ride never ends.

**CHILL OR BE CHILLED: EVEN SKARMIER**

“So. You finally came to visit.” 

“heh. uh. you know, woulda been here sooner, but you _did try to kill my fiancee._ ” Sans says, very, very dryly. “oh. and also me.” He adds as an afterthought, then shrugs and says, “uh, capra too.” 

Gaster peers through the bars of his cell, looking his son over. Sans looks profoundly unamused, which is to say, that he’s got the laziest, most insolent grin he can possibly put on his face, the one that doesn’t even begin to touch his eyes.

“You know very well that I attempted to apologize for that.” Gaster sighs after a moment. “I asked the king specifically -”

“yeah. ‘sorry about the whole murder thing.’” Sans drawls, folding his fingers together behind his head. His grin grows wider. “still don’t think we’ll be extending wedding invites, dad.” He thinks on this for a second, then barks out a laugh. “to be fair, i mean, might be hard to get us anything off the registry, considering.” He nods at the cell, an all encompassing gesture that manages to capture the pitiable conditions.

Gaster had once had access to all of space and time. Presently, he’s restrained to a ten by ten room, with a door made out of iron bars that offers very little privacy. There is a bed. A chair. 

And, to Sans’ immense satisfaction, no window. 

“Well.” Gaster clears his throat after a moment, and then studies his son, if the term “son” really does apply here. “I doubt you came here just-t-t-t to gloat.” He falls into a familiar clicking sound halfway through his sentence, the sound of a clock’s second hand slowly advancing. Sans’ smile is hurting now. 

“...still haven’t lost that _tick_ yet, huh.” He says after a moment, then leans forward slightly. “tell me, pops. your magic. wasn’t always pitch black like that, as i recall.” He taps his chest, right over where his soul lies. “used to look a lot like me. or, i s’pose, i looked like you, huh?”

“I formed you in my image.” Gaster agrees placidly, inclining his head. 

“uh. yeah. so, tell me. what’s that black magic do?” Sans drawls. Gaster looks him up and down once more, but this time, Sans can see the wheels in Gaster’s head turning. 

“What an interesting question.” Gaster says, after a moment. “I’m afraid I don’t have any satisfactory answers. I was quite a different person, you understand. That period of my life is all a little… hazy.” He smiles slowly, pleasantly. “But. To come to me. To ask me about my magic now, after it’s all been… removed…” He muses. “Trouble in paradise, son? Someone’s soul a little darker than it should be? How interest-t-t-”

“dad.” Sans interrupts his father, his eyes bright, his smile cheerful. “do me a favor okay?” He leans in even closer, so the only thing keeping the two of them apart are the iron bars of Gaster’s cell door. “have _fun_ down here.” Sans breathes, and then he turns, strolling lazily away, up the stairs and back to the main floor of King Asgore’s palace. 

\---------------------------------------------------

The last month has been… busy. That’s the polite and pleasant way to put it. It has kept you on your toes. There’s the new (old) job. Managing a small, regional aquarium, it turned out, took a surprising amount of diplomacy and finesse. It was a lot of politely begging for money, a ton of number crunching, and not nearly enough chilling out with the fish. At least you had Undyne. Now that you were in charge, you’d set Undyne loose to show her true potential, and the results had been dazzling. Being able to communicate with all the aquarium animals had its perks - namely, that you hadn’t had a single sick or even unhappy animal since Undyne had been allowed to relay their concerns to you. And, well, yes. It was strange, having a conversation with an eel through an interpreter and plate glass, but the fact remained that the creatures were flourishing, and with them, the crowds. 

Still. That would have been enough to keep you busy, but it wasn’t just that. There had been the wedding, for one. Undyne and Alphys celebration had been… amazing. A ton of work. A metric shit-ton of work, but it had been worth it, to see them standing on the University green, beaming at each other like they couldn’t believe how lucky they’d gotten. And, with you standing at Undyne’s back, Sans standing behind Alphys, you’d seen the look on his face too, the absolute disbelief that it would be his turn next, and it had been… 

Well, honestly, it had been kind of hard to wait an appropriate amount of time before he could take you back home. Between the dancing, the drinking, the way he was looking at you, the handful of stolen kisses, and the constant reminders from all your friends that it would be the two of you before you knew it… You’d been in such a rush to get him alone that it was almost embarrassing. Not that you cared. You’d almost lost him only a little more than a week before the wedding, and if you were still a little single-minded with relief, who could blame you?

But then, well, things had gone a little… a little not great. He’d been reaching out for your soul, when his hand stopped, and he’d immediately leaned in closer, squinting against the brightness of your soul and muttering,

“now what the hell is _that_?” 

“ _That_ ,” it turned out, was the barest flicker of darkness, buried in the core of the radiant light of your soul. And, therefore, “that” had become, very quickly, an enormous pain in the ass.

“babe,” You hear Sans’ voice as he steps through a doorway, back home from wherever he’d gone for ‘soul research,’ “‘m sorry. another dead end. you-”

“I’m _fine._ ” You groan. “Seriously. It’s been a whole month since I pulled the sponge act. If I was suddenly gonna grow extra heads or eight legs or something-”

“not funny-”

“I woulda grown them by now.” You insist, leaning back into the couch cushions and talking over him. “Now, c’mon. It’s the weekend. You _promised_ that we could just chill today. Look.” You nod at the TV. “Spaceballs. And look,” again, you nod, this time at the coffee table, “Mettaton made those little spinach puffs. And Undyne bought a case of those IPAs from the brew pub downtown. So, you know, great afternoon, all set up, just-”

“k. k. but. hear me out.” Sans begins, and you groan again. “can we just check one thing in the lab first?” 

“Sans-”

“YES!” Capra, perched in the recliner (and up to this point absorbed in Spaceballs) interrupts, his eyes wide. “Guys. You promised.” 

Okay, so that was the other thing that had happened, this past month. And it was… it was a weird thing. 

\---------------------------------------

You’d been visiting Capra in the hospital more or less daily, since, well, you felt a little personally responsible for his bevy of injuries. And, well, also… you _had_ blamed him for the kidnapping and subsequent bloodletting of dozens of monsters. And all that horror _had_ happened because your aunt had been talked into something beyond her capacity to understand, and you’d been too furious with her to notice the signs when things started going badly for her. 

And… and fine. Pompous ass or not, he was a friend. And beneath that sleek and charming veneer, you were growing increasingly secure in the belief that there was a good person in there. A good person who was constantly flirting with you and your fiance, sure, but a good person all the same. 

So you’d been there, that first week, you’d celebrated with him when the bandages came off his eye and he was able to see out of it again, and you’d been just delighted when the hospital said that he was cleared to go home, that he was out of the woods and any further recovery could be done out of a hospital bed. Until, well-

“bet you’re psyched to get back to the supervillain lair.” Sans had teased, grinning at Capra as the man struggled to sign his discharge papers with his bad hand. 

“Oh buddy, you’d better believe it.” Capra had smirked, then said, “But, hey, wait, it’s not a supervillain lair, it’s just totally designed to run on solar and-”

“Wait.” The attending nurse had suddenly snapped to attention, and looked at the three of you. “Is he talking about just going to his house?”

“uh, yeah.” Sans had said with a shrug. 

“Um. Does he have anyone there to help him? Does his house have stairs? Can someone cook for him and help him get around-”

“I’ll figure it out.” Capra cut her off haughtily. She glared at him for a long moment, then said, 

“If that’s a no, I can’t let him go.” 

“No, no, listen, it’ll be fine, I can figure it out-” Capra had instantly begun wheedling, but it seemed like whatever charm he possessed as CEO of EbbCo had been diminished when he’d become a bruised and battered patient with multiple casts, because the nurse didn’t even blink. 

“Mhm, I don’t think so.” She’d said. 

You’d felt Sans’ eyes on you. 

For a long, long second, you’d pretended not to know what that gaze meant, because you knew this was how it started. You did this, and your future would be cemented. It would just be you and him and a house full of strays for the rest of your life. And…

Oh, goddamn it. You had a soft spot for strays too. 

“Come on, Capra. You can crash with us until you can start doing stuff on your own again.” You’d sighed, giving him a small shrug. “There’s bedrooms on the first floor, and one of us can give you a lift to work and stuff.”

“Really?”

“really?” Sans and Capra had asked at the same time. 

“Yeah. It’s a revolving door at the party mansion anyway, right? What’s one more mouth to feed?” You’d said dryly, not realizing at that moment what you were in for. 

\--------------------------------------------

“You promised.” Capra reminds you again. “You guys said that if I worked hard enough at my PT to be able to do the stairs with a crutch, I could come check out the dope-ass secret lab.” 

“Oh my god, Capra, you sound like you’re twelve.” 

“Promise is a promise, bitches.” He smirks, leaning back in the recliner. God, he’d been such a pain to actually motivate into doing his physical therapy - it had come hard to him, and he was not accustomed to things being hard for him to accomplish - that you really had needed to dangle this in front of him, the carrot on the string. 

“we did promise.” Sans sighs. 

“We did.” You groan. “Okay, Cap. I’m into this movie so I don’t want to have to wait and watch your busted ass hobble up some stairs right now, we’re just gonna take a shortcut and you’d better not be lying to me, deal?” 

“She’s cranky.” Capra says in a stage whisper to Sans. 

“nice try bud, you’re not getting me deeper into the doghouse than i already am.” Sans sidesteps that particular temptation neatly, which is enough to make you thaw, just a little.

“Sans. Seriously. This is going to be a ‘two minute staring at me under the camera’ thing, not a ‘two hour staring and muttering’ experience, right?” You check once again, and he sighs. 

“two minutes. tops.” He agrees. Capra makes an unkind snorting noise that’s clearly meant to convey disbelief, and you turn to glare at him again. 

“Yeah. Keep pushing it.” You say slowly, and he holds up his hands. 

“I’ll be good.” He blatantly lies, and, groaning, begins the slow and painful process of standing up. He’d shifted out of the wheelchair this week, and started the slow process of learning to do everything with crutches (and, well, a broken arm and ribs). 

“need help?” Sans checks, and Capra winces. 

“I’m good. I’m good. Just gimme a…. fuck. Ow. Hang on.” As he stands up, you take a moment to admire his casts, which both Frisk and Papyrus had insisted on signing (several times each). Capra had been a spectacular sport about that, which was probably just because he enjoyed how much Frisk and Papyrus wanted to play action figures with him. 

Finally, everyone is more or less in order, and Sans quickly traces a door leading up to the lab, sensing, perhaps, that if he takes his time, you’ll change your mind. Spot, who is presently sprawled in a sunbeam with Ghost snoozing on her snout, glances up from her spot on the floor, making a tiny grumble. Right. That had changed too, having an indoor Spot. It had required some learning on everyone’s part - Spot, figuring out how to navigate doorways cautiously, and you, moving some of the more breakable furniture to places in the house she just couldn’t fit. “Nah, just hang tight there.” You tell her. “We’ll be back in a minute, and you’ll be bumping into everything up there.” 

Spot heaves a heavy sigh, and after a moment, her eyesockets slowly close again as she drifts back off to sleep. You grin fondly at her, and then the three of you step through to the lab, Capra’s eyes wide with barely concealed delight. 

“Aw. Aw, cool. Aw man.” He groans, the second that he’s through. Sans can’t help it. He looks terribly smug as Capra tries to take everything in all at once. 

“yeah. christmas present.” He says casually, and you snort and nudge him with your shoulder, sealing the door behind you and heading over to the windows to begin to pull the shades. 

“Wait, why are we blocking the nice view?” Capra demands, and Sans begins to explain about the camera that can see not only souls, but the magic filtering into your soul. You’d explained bits and pieces to him about how you’d managed to defeat Gaster, but he always had follow up questions, and neither of you honestly _knew_ enough to answer them. Human mages were still more or less a mystery, and it seems like they’re going to stay that way, since Asgore had the Badbad Book in his possession, and your little spiral notebook of Doris’ discoveries was… less than savory. 

(Oh, and also, it featured the vaguest damn warning of all time.)

“okay. let’s fire it up.” Sans is saying, moving the lever that shifts the camera array. 

“Please.” You groan. “It’s not gonna change, dude, it’s literally been the same this entire time-”

“Good scientist takes thorough observations.” Capra chides you, and Sans grins at him for a second - before he remembers that it might get him in trouble, anyway. 

“Let’s just do it.” You groan, after you’ve glared at both of them for several seconds. Sans flicks another switch, and there’s that familiar “booop” sound of cameras starting, monitors flickering on, machinery coming to life, and then there it is, on the screen, like always. That brilliant red-orange-yellow soul, the blue of Sans’ magic being drawn into it, and that new feature that Sans was so concerned about, that tiny spot of darkness in the very center that occasionally flickered into view as the fiery colors of your soul shifted. 

“Holy shit, cool?” Capra says, and begins to hobble over to the monitor from his spot by the window on the other side of the room. “Goddamn it, _______, your parents were smart as hell, I swear to god…” 

“See. Nothing’s changed.” You tell Sans, ignoring Capra for the time being. 

“just lemme take the measurements again. babe, can you hold like…. just a littttle more still?” Sans says, and you groan, then take a deep breath and hold it, knowing that complying will get this all done faster. 

“k. perfect, thanks, that should be - wait. what the hell…” Sans trails off, squinting. 

“What ‘what the hell’?” You demand, releasing your held breath. Sans doesn’t answer, just leaning closer to the monitor, a puzzled look on his face. “Sans. Baby. You’re killing me here.” You say, when another few seconds creep by. 

“babe. c’mere and look at this.” He says. 

“What is it?” Capra demands, lurching forward on his crutches again - he’s so bad at them! You step forward to the monitor, saying, 

“You know that if I go to look at it, I won’t be on camera anymore, right - oh.”

“...yeah.” Sans agrees, and for a moment, the two of you stare at the screen, as the cameras capture Capra’s metallic purple soul….

And the thin tendril of ambient blue magic that’s snaking its way into the center of it. Just like _your_ soul absorbed stray magic. But you, you’re a mage, right? You can, at least in theory, use that magic that you draw in! And if _you_ can do that, well, that means, Capra...

“Oh.” You repeat again, and blink. “Well, shit.”


	94. Wherein You Have A Series of Terrible Conversations With Capra

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay! Back in action!
> 
> [Get at me, bros.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)
> 
> [F.art. ](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

"Um. So I just need to… stand here?” Tommy says skeptically, looking at the camera array like he’s not entirely convinced that it won’t just begin to shoot out lasers.

“Yeah, kid. Relax, it’s just cameras.” Capra’s practically drooling, looking at the monitor that Sans is about turn on like he’s Gollum, and it’s the One Ring. Sans sighs, looking Capra over in dismay, and you nudge him and smile reassuringly at Tommy. The lab feels astonishingly crowded with you, Sans, Capra, Tommy _and_ Aaron all present - well, particularly due to Aaron, who just takes up so much space! The monster in question whinnies out a laugh at his boyfriend’s nervous expression. 

“Don’t worry so much, stud.” Aaron teases Tommy. “I mean, it’s _______. It’s not like she’s gonna do anything that would hurt ya.” He winks at you, and you smile at him, nodding. 

“We’re just… triple checking something. And you’re the only human we, um-”

“...know.” Sans completes the thought with a snort, then he looks at you. “babe, you need more human friends.” He says, as if he’s just putting this together. “you seriously only hang out with us, that’s not-”

“Uh, Sans? Another time, maybe?” You begin, then sigh, coming up behind him to wrap your arms around his waist. “You’re stalling, bonehead.” You inform him, brushing your lips against the top of his skull. He chuckles, then glances at Capra. 

“maybe i am. can you blame me?” He says pointedly. You can’t. If this experiment plays out the way that you are all expecting it will, there’s going to be some pretty strong evidence that Capra’s a mage. And that is going to mean, oh, an entire world of trouble. 

“Guys. You’re killing me.” Capra grimaces. “Just… flip the switch!” 

“ugh. already regretting this.” Sans says darkly, hesitates for just a second longer, and then flips the switch, plunging the room into darkness for a moment before the monitor flickers on.

For a second, you all focus on the brilliant green soul floating in the monitor, waiting, and then Sans groans. “damn it.” There’s some ambient magic in the room - the twisting blues of Sans, the bright yellow of Aaron, but… it’s just hanging there in the air, or winding through the air towards you (and, in much smaller amounts, towards Capra). Tommy’s soul isn’t absorbing it. You all wait for a long moment; you suspect that you’re not alone in hoping that the magic will suddenly start drifting in. 

The magic stubbornly refuses to do so. Which means...

“Oh, fuck yes.” Capra hisses, pumping his fist and then wincing when the motion hurts. “Oh… holy shit guys. Holy shit. I’m-”

“-gonna be a huge pain in the ass.” Sans predicts, cutting Capra off from his celebration. “first, you know this isn’t a big enough sample size. second, even if this does mean you can use magic, capra, ‘s not just like… superpowers. there’s a lot that goes into this.” He mutters.

“Don’t care, I can figure that out later.” Capra says, utterly blase. “Guys-”

“No, Capra, look. it’s not just ‘boom, I have powers,’” You try, “I mean, it takes work, but sometimes it just _happens_ and you’re… I mean, I almost killed a lady because I didn’t know what I was doing, and you don’t always have the um, best, um… temper, and-”

“Look, pal, we’ll figure it out. I mean, _you_ did, eventually! So, it can’t be that hard, right?” Capra smirks at you. 

“Guys?” You’re so busy glaring at Capra, you’ve almost forgotten Tommy. When he speaks up, you almost jump. “Um. I’m sorry. Don’t mean to interrupt, but…” He ducks his head shyly in the dark room, then nods at the monitor. “Is that my… soul?” He whispers, and you realize at once how forgetful you’d been. Tommy wasn’t a mage, so Tommy had never seen souls before, not even his own. 

“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry, Tommy-” You begin, but Aaron, sounding hoarse (oh god, sounding “hoarse,” you’d need to tell Sans that one later) speaks up at once. 

“Yeah, T. That’s all you, baby.” He says roughly, watching Tommy’s face as his boyfriend studies the soul glowing on the monitor. 

“This is what you see every time you look at me?” Tommy sounds a little choked up, and Aaron nods.

“When I’m looking for it. And… I always am.” He says quietly. The two of them gaze into each other’s eyes for a long, long moment. 

You, Sans and Capra exchange glances, the three of you suddenly realizing that you’re abruptly in the middle of a very private moment. 

“uh… we’ll get out of your hair.” Sans mutters quietly, and Capra squirms uncomfortably, making a hurry up gesture. “kinda forgot this would be a big… uh. yeah. just um… come on down when you’re… yeah.” He fumbles, and when neither Aaron or Tommy respond to this, he hurriedly cuts a doorway, nodding the two of you through. You don’t think you’ve ever seen Capra look as discomfited before - he hobbles through the doorway as fast as you’ve seen him move since he’d gotten out of the hospital. You’re right on his heels. You’d honestly forgotten the fact that seeing your soul - and Sans’ - for the first time had been an intensely personal experience. Better to just… not be present for that, let them have that moment without the three of you bickering. 

“How do you guys do that?” Capra demands, once you’re all back down in the family room. “Just have all those… _feelings_ all the time?” You trade a glance with Sans once more. 

“Cap…” You begin, then sigh and shake your head. “Forget it. But look, you’ve gotta be cool about this, okay? I mean, the magic thing. Well, the Aaron and Tommy thing too.” Sans nods his agreement, collapsing onto the couch. 

“we dunno what you can do. we don’t know _anything_ about human mages, really. just her, and she’s…” He makes a face with a vague gesture, and you glare at him. 

“There’s nothing wrong with my magic. Or my soul. It’s a surface change.” You insist, and flop down on the couch next to him. Capra groans. He’s heard this argument a thousand times already. 

“Can’t we at least try to see if I can do cool shit?” He wheedles. “I mean, how else am I ever going to figure it out? Good scientist tests his hypothesis. My hypothesis is that I’ve got magic. Let’s do some tests, gang.” He says, giving you a thousand watt grin. “C’mon. ‘S me. What am I even gonna do? Just tell me where to start, I’ll keep it simple, promise.”

Against your will, you feel yourself beginning to be swayed. After all, you’d been desperate to use your magic for at least one thing - to see Sans’ soul - so you could kind of empathize. “We… I mean, we could start him on soul stuff.” You tell Sans. 

“hm. yeah. i suppose. seems… harmless enough. ‘s long as he doesn’t go around touching other people’s.” Sans mutters. “capra, don’t go around touching other people’s souls.” 

“Um. Deal.” Capra says, eyes bright. “Okay, let’s get cracking. Come on. First soul stuff, next step, magic missile. Oh, god, I hope I don’t get a spear. No offense. Just, spears are lame.” He says excitedly. You roll your eyes, then a thought occurs to you. 

“Um. I mean. Um. We might need to put this on hold for a while, though. Uh.” You mutter, rubbing your forehead again as you realize the talk you’re going to have to have just now. 

“What?” Capra’s all hurt indignance. “Why!? Let’s do it now, while we have momentum!” That doesn’t exactly make sense, but Sans is looking at you, confused, as well. Which means that you’re going to have to be the one to bite the bullet. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. 

“Okay. So. Just so we’re on the same page, all of us.” You say, feeling the tension begin to gather in your head again. Oh, god, you were going to need a huge dose of aspirin by the end of this little talk. “You were stuck in the elevator while Doris was-”

“Monologuing.” Capra supplies cheerily. You sigh, and incline your head. 

“Yeah. That.” You say. Sans is still looking a little confused, but, seeing that you’re having a tough time with this, he leans against you, wrapping his arm around your shoulder. Which normally helps, but… “Well, so you heard where she said human magic came from. Drinking monster blood and dust and stuff. I mean, you know, the king has been keeping all that super quiet, but… anyway. You were there. You have the gist. So. Me. Magic. Me and magic.” You clear your throat again, and Sans makes a soft, upset noise as he realizes what’s happening at last. “Obviously, I’m not being a monster vampire or anything like that. Uh…” Capra stares at you, his face a mask of confusion and hurt feelings. 

For a second. Then he bursts out laughing.

“Heh, yeah, guys, I’ve been living here for like a month, trust me, we all know where your magic comes from.” He says, flopping into the recliner and looking profoundly amused. You stare at him. Sans stares at him. 

“wait, what-”

“Um. Have you, you know, _been around you_?” Capra demands, grinning obnoxiously now, as he realizes he’s successfully ruffled your feathers. “Or furthermore, you know, the fish-lady? Because I’m pretty sure she doesn’t know what innuendo is, she basically just says exactly what she’s thinking and then looks around at everyone like she just made a joke? Also… I mean, I read Alphys’ manga, and she’s gone into detail-”

“Capra.” You try, rubbing your forehead. You’re not sure if you’re mad at him for bringing this up now, or amazed that he’d had the restraint not to mention it for nearly a month.

“Anyway. If _that’s_ how humans get magic, I don’t think there’s gonna be a problem.” Capra drawls, absently leaning over to scratch Spot’s snout. “Question. Have you guys worked out if you have to be on the, uh, receiving end yet, or is... uh, the other thing cool-” He clearly thinks he’s being tactful. He clearly isn’t. 

“oh my god, capra.” Sans groans. 

“Oh my god.” You repeat, and take a moment to bury your face in the shearling of Sans’ hood, praying for this moment to be over. Please, please let it be over. You wait until Capra has stopped snickering unpleasantly before peeking up at him again, your cheeks warm. He’s got… oh god, he’s got the worst smile ever on his face. 

“Please. I’m sorry. I interrupted. Continue.” He drawls. He is enjoying every single minute of this. 

“Well. Do you see the problem?” You finally manage. “You’ve been here for like, almost a month, so unless you’ve been um, getting into strange monsters’ pants without my noticing-”

“uh.” Says Sans. 

“Um.” Agrees Capra. 

You glance at the two of them in turn. “Oh god.” You mutter for perhaps the thousandth time this day. “I… I just washed his sheets, Sans. I literally just touched them. Who? … _Whyyyy?_ ”

“uh, who’s a famous celebrity robot ghost man who’s been crashing here a suspicious amount of time, considering that he’s just opened a new casino?” Sans drawls, as if it should be obvious. Well, in retrospect, it is obvious, because it certainly hadn’t been Alphys, Undyne or Sans, and if it had been Papyrus, Capra would probably be a bloody smear on the floor right now, instead of the smug looking asshole in your dad’s favorite recliner. 

“How long has this been going on?” You ask, somewhat masochistically. 

“dunno. don’t wanna know. caught ‘em yesterday-”

“Well, you wouldn’t have if you had doors with locks, christ!” Capra says darkly, though he still looks way, WAY too amused for the situation. 

“Shut up, Capra, I don’t want to hear this right now. You let me wash your sheets.” You repeat. “And Sans. My fiance. Love of my life, et cetera. Have you been keeping secrets from me?”

“it was yesterday night!” He protests. “we had a hot date planned, i wasn’t gonna ruin it with _that_ mental image! it was for your own good!” Oh, you didn’t like that. You decide you can have that talk later, and glance back at Capra. 

“I thought you and Mettaton hated each other.” You say, and Capra shrugs. 

“We do.” 

You think about that for a moment, then bury your head in your hands, giving up entirely. 

“poor babe.” Sans sighs, rubbing your back. 

“Anyway. Let’s get started. Time for magic shit.” Capra begins, and you’re just looking up to scream at him that you need a moment when you spy Tommy peeking shyly around the doorframe.

“Uh, hey guys.” He says, then grins adorably. “Um. Thanks for having us over. It was… really good. Um. Me and Aaron are going to get married, we decided, so...”

“Tommy, that’s amazing!” You say, bouncing up to hug him. For a split second, your irritation with Capra is forgotten, until you hear a quiet voice from the direction of the recliner saying, 

“Fuck, the _feelings_ in this household…”

You were actually going to kill him. 

You just had to make sure that he knew enough about his magic that he didn’t, well, kill anyone else first.


	95. Wherein You Go For A Dip in the Ocean (Notice There's No "P" In There [Let's Try And Keep It That Way])

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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“You’re shitting me. He’s magic now?” Undyne sounds like you’ve just delivered a crushing blow. “Man, this is going to go right to his head.” 

“I am still literally right here.” Capra reminds her. She snorts, giving him a toothy grin. 

“Well, you’re lucky you’ve got a pal like me looking out for you, Crap-ra. You remember what happened to Skarm-girl, right?”

“Not my nickname.” You sigh, running a hand through your hair. You wish Sans was here, but he’d offered to take Aaron and Tommy home before you could, and Undyne, Alphys and Papyrus had all returned from the grocery store a split second later, so it seemed that you were the only person responsible for this conversation. 

“Fine, skerd.” 

“Don’t.” You threaten weakly. Skeleton nerd is a bit too much. 

“Also, I’d appreciate not being called Crap-ra.” Capra chimes in. “Peter’s fine. Seriously. All of you guys can call me-”

“ANYWAY.” Undyne charges on. “Toriel yelled at Sans for not getting her trained. She killed like fifty soccer moms because she wasn’t in control of all her limbs and she’s got the bloodlust.” She says knowledgably. “Toriel told Sans that either he trained her, or she’d be in huge trouble. Uncontrolled magic is dangerous!”

“...That’s not exactly how it happened.” You try to remind her, and she grins. 

“Right, well, Toriel also said some stuff about magical eja-”

“UNDYNE.” You groan. Capra’s still perched in his recliner, enjoying the hell out of all of this. Undyne grins even wider at you, then looks back at Capra. 

“Anywaaaaay.” She drawls. “You’ll need a coach. I’m great at coaching. You’ll be exploding stuff before you even know it.” She advises Capra. He thinks about this for a moment, then says, calmly, 

“I think I am actually in love with you.” He beams at Undyne, then glares at you. “See. _______. _Someone_ gets it. I have to learn how to use my magic, or I might kill fifty soccer moms.” He beams at Undyne, who nods very approvingly. You glance between the two of them, a sinking feeling in your chest. Oh god. Capra really, really should not be granted limitless destructive potential. 

“Look.” You finally sigh. “Feel free to take a crack at it, but no attacks yet? Okay?” You study Undyne for a long long moment, so she realizes you’re serious. “Just, uh, see if you can get him seeing souls. That’s step one. We have no idea what that disco ball soul even does, you know? You ever see one like that?”

“Nah.” Undyne shrugs, and Capra’s brow furrows. 

“So. It’s not normal to have a shiny purple soul, I’m gathering.” He tests out, thinking this over for a long moment. 

“‘s not normal to have a shiny soul, period.” Sans abruptly interjects, stepping through a doorway into the family room. “oh, hey undyne.”

“Finally!” Undyne laughs (after jumping a little at Sans’ sudden appearance). “We got all the grilling stuff, dude, we were just waiting for you before we hit the beach!”

“ah. we’re having beach time?” He says, arching a browbone. “can it wait a little? we didn’t really get the chance to finish up upstairs-”

“Oh my god, Sans.” You groan. “Look. You can feel free to do as many experiments as you want upstairs, but don’t count on my soul being there for them, because it’s going to be outside with the rest of me, enjoying the fact that it’s almost June and the water’s finally warm enough to swim in.” 

“Heck yeah, buddy!” Undyne crows, wrapping her arm around your neck in what you think is supposed to be a friendly suplex. It’s either that or the precursor to a noogie. Either way, you know her well enough to just go limp and wait for it to be over. “Besides. I think your soul looks rad now. Super hardcore.” She says, and you grin at Sans from her grip.

“See?” You laugh. “So, look. You can be a boring science butthole, but I’m going to enjoy my weekend-”

“boring science butthole.” Sans repeats, both browbones fully raised. You think about this, then nod enthusiastically (or as enthusiastically as you can with Undyne’s arm around your neck still). Finally, he lets out a low chuckle. “k. i guess i did tell paps i’d get him hooked up with some floaties, anyway. think that’ll make his swimming lessons go a little easier.” 

“But I can start trying to learn magic on the beach, right?” Capra interjects. “Since. You know. All busted up, can’t go swimming or do other beach stuff. Technically your fault.” 

“oh yeah. my fault that you saw a mutant horror step out of the fourth dimension and you decided to _punch_ it.” 

“Hey! It worked on the old lady!” Capra protests, and before Sans can settle into bicker, you wriggle loose from Undyne and take his hand, lifting it to your lips. He gives you a wide smile, the kind that still makes your heart pound after all this time, and you forgive him for harping on the lab thing so much. He was just worried for you. You couldn’t blame him. 

“Come on.” You urge. “Let’s get swimsuits on. Cap… why don’t you start heading outside and, you know, by the time we’re all ready to go, you’ll have made it over there?”

\--------------------------------------

Stupid crutches. Stupid goddamn crutches. Stupid ribs. Stupid leg. Oh, he knew he was lucky. He knew he was lucky just to be alive. There’d been a while there where he’d been limp on the ground, seriously considering that this was how he would go, a bleeding mess under EbbCo. CEO of EbbCo was apparently, not the safest title. 

But hey. He had friends! He had real, genuine friends, the kind he’d only _sort of_ had to buy! Furthermore... he had _strong_ friends. Like… almost scary strong friends. He worried about that sometimes, about people figuring out how strong you were, or how strong Sans was, for that matter. People didn’t do well when they were worried about getting stomped like ants. And who among them would take the time to learn that you were, like, the last person who would be doing any stomping? Well. Probably. He had some questions about the soccer mom story now, but…

“Fuck!” He misplaces a crutch and stumbles forward for a second, catching himself just before he topples to the ground. Oh, hell. He couldn’t fall. Even if he didn’t break more bones, it would be terribly undignified, and right now, being forced to wear a… _t-shirt_ and, worse, _shorts_ , he was at the limit for how much indignity he could tolerate. Just focus, Capra. He was lucky, remember? Lucky that he’d survived. Lucky that he had actual friends - friends that would call up the goddamn queen of monsters just to see if she could lay on hands and heal his broken-ass body a little bit. And, well, it had helped. It helped each time. His doctors said that he’d be out of his casts before he even knew it, that he was healing amazingly fast. His face had already patched up, more or less. The lurid red of that scar was fading to something he hoped would end up pearly white. Well. It would be fine if it didn’t. He was lucky, after all, and that extended to the fact that he looked hot as balls with that scar. Seriously. Ridiculously handsome. He’d seen himself on TV, reviewing the press conference as he announced that the people of the township of Ebott were going to be getting totally free power, thanks to the generosity of King Asgore and the monsters and… and he’d almost swooned, he was so good looking. 

Plus, hey. Magic now. He was magic now. He pushes at the gate in the stone retaining wall separating your yard from the beach with a crutch, and hobbles through quickly, wincing. He’d always figured that he’d be magic, but it was nice to have the confirmation. Oh, hell, Peter, none of them were around here yet, you could just let yourself have this moment. He pauses, feeling the warm sun on his face, and lets his face split into an ecstatic grin. This was… it was…

“Goodness, don’t you look happy.” A soft voice drawls. Oh, goddamn it. 

“It’s a nice day outside.” He says, shrugging very lazily (as well as he can with a crutch under each armpit. “Sun’s shining. Birds… birding. What’s not to be happy about?”

“Mmm.” Mettaton says dismissively, stretching back out on his towel, next to that brilliant solar charging panel - fuck, add that to the list of things he needed to pester Alphys about, he couldn’t figure out how she’d designed something so efficient- “Peter. You’re staring.” Mettaton interrupts his train of thought, the robot’s lips curled up in that obnoxious little smile. Oh, he’s going to do … _things_ to that smile later, he thinks blackly.

“Nah. Just blinded from the glare coming off your shiny ass.” He drawls, wishing that you or Sans would show up with a chair. His crutches were burying further and further into the sand, and he just _hated_ it when Mettaton saw that he needed help. 

“Odd. You’ve never had a problem with my ass before.” Mettaton smirks, and Capra asks himself, for perhaps the thousandth time, why. Just… why. 

“About that.” He sighs, and does his best to put a kinder expression on his face. “Cat’s out of the bag, Threepio. And by ‘cat’ I mean ‘us fucking.’ Everyone’ll know about it before the day’s over.” Mettaton’s composure slips, and for the first time, he looks slightly alarmed. 

“Why on _earth_ would you tell-”

“I didn’t!” Capra protests, which is only kind of a lie. 

“Then who… ah. _Sans._ ” Mettaton hisses venomously, reminding Capra of some sort of grumpy… whatever, what kind of animal was sleek and polished and got grumpy, like a mongoose or something? A seal? No, seals didn’t- “Did he… Oh, for the love of… Capra! Can you focus for more than a split second on _anything_ that isn’t about you?!” Mettaton interjects. Mettaton is ridiculously good at noticing the moments that his attention wanders. It’s infuriating. 

“It _is_ about me, asshole-” He begins, but then Mettaton sighs. 

“Well, they’re coming. Probably to mock me for my terrible choices.” He says, nodding over Capra’s shoulder. “I hope you’re satisfied.” 

“Not particularly.” Capra sighs, and then, unable to help himself, adds, “Of course, you could fix that for me later.” He gives Mettaton a huge, dangerous grin, and is pleased to see the robot’s composure crumble; for a second, Mettaton is lost for words, which is an achievement in itself. But, ha, then there’s the soft thud of feet hitting the sand from the retaining wall, and Mettaton’s run out of time for a comeback. Oh, Capra feels wonderful about that, even if he’s subject to your withering, unamused stare only a second later. 

“Capra. Mettaton. Boys.” You say, very dryly. “Having a nice chat?”

“Oh, wonderful, darling, Peter was just telling me about some dreary science thing and I was, as usual, feigning interest” Mettaton is too effusive and eager. Capra sighs mentally. The robot is a terrible liar. It’s honestly a miracle they hadn’t been caught sooner. 

“how about that.” Sans says, and Capra turns to look at you and the skeleton, bracing himself. Yup, that is an annoying smile on his best friend’s face. That is possibly the most annoying smile Capra has ever seen. And he can’t be an asshole back, because he has to remember that his first priority is doing magic shit now, which means no pissing you guys off, which means...

“Hey, you brought me a beach chair! Thanks!” He says happily, dropping a crutch and holding his hand out. You finally laugh and pass it over, then turn to Sans, eyes alight.

“Want to go swimming now?!” You ask eagerly, throwing your towel haphazardly on the sand and tugging your oversized t-shirt over your head, revealing your swimsuit. Capra watches the lights in Sans’ eyes go slightly fuzzy as he gets distracted by the sudden change of scenery - hell, Capra can in no way blame him, fuck! _NO. BAD. YOU LITERALLY BABYSAT HER,_ he reminds himself firmly, before that train of thought can leave the station.

“See something interesting, Peter?” Mettaton asks sweetly, and Sans swivels his head slowly, arching an eyebrow as he looks at his beleaguered best friend. Fucking… oh, he was going to do something awful to Mettaton one of these days, he swore to god. 

“Just trying to fucking… sit.” He groans, making the process of getting his injured body into the chair look more awkward than it really, technically is. The accusing look on Sans’ face falls. 

“eesh. sorry bud. you ok, or-” 

“I got it.” Capra assures him, feeling something vaguely in the guilt family. You sigh impatiently, and tug Sans’ hand. 

“C’mon, baby. Let’s go swimming. Or, you know, wading in your case. Sorry you sink.” You say, tilting your head prettily. Sans is helpless to that, of course. 

“k.” He agrees, pulling his shirt off. This time, Capra’s smart enough to avert his eyes, but… unf, goddamn, the two of you, it is a goddamn shame that you’re not open to - okay. Okay. That’s enough, Peter. “let’s give these two lovebirds some privacy.” Sans adds, looking at Capra and Mettaton with a huge grin. You let out a peal of laughter, and tug him towards the water, leaving Capra and Mettaton to stare after them.

“He’s actually the worst.” Capra sighs, after a moment.

“Second worst.” Mettaton says pointedly, turning onto his back and stretching out in the sun.

Oh, Capra hates it when he gets the last word.

\-----------------------------------------------

Sans is a good sport about swimming in the chilly water - actually, he’s great. He has questions about everything, of course. What kind of fish those minnows were, are there sharks, can you fight a shark, how are you floating like that? That last question makes you chuckle and swim over to him, where he’s standing, up to his shoulders, in the water. 

“Humans are buoyant. Which we knew. But we’re more buoyant in saltwater.” You explain, settling your feet down in the sand next in front of his. 

“huh. oh, because… cool!” Sans works this out in his head, then smiles at you. “i’ve never really been swimmin’ before. i mean. not that this is swimming.” He nods self consciously at himself, and you sigh, draping your arms over his shoulders. 

“I think this counts as swimming.” You assure him, leaning in to kiss him softly, but refusing to linger too long, aware of Mettaton and Capra on the shore (and, much further in the distance, Undyne, Alphys and Papyrus, who are hauling out the grill with Lesser Dog frolicking at their heels). Sans senses your reluctance, surely, because he gives you a big, mischievous grin, and slides his hands to your butt under the water, letting out a surprised laugh when his sneaky grab lifts you off your feet.  
“ha. you’re so light underwater. ‘s like my magic…” He says distractedly, and you laugh again, nuzzling his neck. 

“You’re such a nerd.” You tell him lovingly, then shoo his hands up to your waist so that you can address him seriously for a second. “While we’re out here. Before they all join us.” You begin. “Are you… okay? You look a little stressed out, baby. I don’t like it. Especially if it’s about my soul, because… you know. It’s really not bothering me right now at all, I promise. I really haven’t noticed any change.” You say, urging him to hear the sincerity in your voice. 

“yeah. still gonna worry, though. souls don’t change like that. monster souls don’t, anyway. but remember your aunt’s soul? all gray and rotten with that tiny bit of red inside? and now, capra… there’s just so much i don’t know.” He says softly, then, his cheeks coloring a little, he clears his throat. “but. so. uh. tommy and aaron are gettin’ married now.” 

“Yeah!” You say happily. “Gosh, isn’t that the best? They’re so cute together. Seems like they really love each other too. I’m so happy for them.” Sans studies you for a second, the lights in his eyes inscrutable. 

“me too.” He says, then rubs his temple, pulling his hand from the water to do so. “but. uh.” He closes his eyes after a moment, gathering his resolve. “babe. please. just tell me. what am i doin’ wrong?” 

You blink at him, mystified by the question. He makes a quiet, distressed noise, then says, “‘s just… you know. us. gettin’ married. why haven’t we, y’know, started doing anything about it? lookin’ at places? picking a date? any of that stuff? is it… did you change your mind?” Your heart plummets, seeing the guarded expression on his face, the way he still can’t meet your eyes. 

“Sans. I’m so sorry. Of course I haven’t changed my mind.” You breathe, no longer caring that your friends might be watching you - you draw close, kissing him again, this time as sweetly and lovingly as you know how. He makes a sound from somewhere deep in his chest while your lips are still pressed to his, and again, your heart begins to stammer, feeling overwhelmed as you realize he’d been harboring this fear in secret - _harboring,_ oh god, now was not the time for puns. Or maybe it was. When it was with Sans, it was always a pretty good time for puns. You finally pull away again, taking in his relieved, confused face. 

“then… what’s been going on? what’s the holdup?” He asks quietly, and you sigh. 

“I’ve been doing some research, and talking to Lawyerpants and… I think we should hold off until Asgore’s accord is completed. I need to know that the humans will recognize our marriage. It’s stupid and not at all romantic and thoroughly practical, I know, but… when we have kids, I want you to be their legal dad,” (his eyes light up at this, as they always do on the rare occasion that you talk about children) “and since, you know, it’s looking like adoption for us... “ You say, shrugging a little, like the thought doesn’t disappoint you in the slightest - oh, fuck, it doesn’t disappoint you, and at the same time it does, a little, but that’s a whole other can of worms - “I just want… I don’t want anyone to be able to say that this doesn’t count.” You say, nodding at the small (watery) space between the two of you. “I promise you, love, it has nothing at all to do with you, other than, you know, I love you and I want to make sure that the world respects that love. I still should have actually talked about this with you. It’s just been such an insane month-” 

“it has.” He agrees at once. “an’... i shoulda said something sooner, i just…” 

“I know.” You sigh, and kiss him again, fleetingly. Your heart is still pounding, shocked by the realization he’d been carrying this inside this whole time and you hadn’t even known. “Still. Talk to me, baby. I can’t fix anything I don’t know about. I don’t like secrets.” You say, and he looks at you, his expression once again unreadable - oh, he’s either looking at your left boob or your soul, and you’re guessing, given the context, it’s the latter - before he kisses you roughly one last time, hotly enough that you’re beginning to wonder if maybe he _had_ been looking at your left boob.

But then Undyne emerges, screaming “SHARK ATTACK!” about a foot away from you, and you jump up into Sans’ arms in a panic. He bursts out laughing when he realizes what had just happened, and refuses to put you back down even when you begin to squirm, a happy light in his eyes - god, he looks so relieved now that you can’t believe you hadn’t noticed he’d been carrying that burden more or less on his own. You want to lecture him, but, goddamn it, he looks so happy that you can’t quite bring yourself to do so. 

“Undyne!” Capra roars from the shore. “Did I win?” 

“Nah!” She yells back. “Hands were totally in PG places. I think he was staring at her boob, though!”

You and Sans mull this over for a second as Papyrus lurches out towards you, several sets of swimmies lining his arms. 

“Did they just bet on if we were -”

“yup.” Sans says, resigned. 

“...So, like, on the other hand we could elope and not invite any of these assholes-” You begin, but this sets off Undyne, who splashes you in indignation. This, of course, mostly hits Sans, who growls with indignation, and releases you at last to begin one of the most epic splash battles of all time, particularly when Spot floats out and bellyflops into the waves, keening joyfully. 

“Better than spending the afternoon in the lab doing tests, right bonehead?” You finally ask him, during a lull in the war (now clinging to him, piggyback, and rather enjoying the fact that you can let your hands drift over his ribs from this position, and that he can’t complain about it even when you find the _interesting_ spots.)

“heh. yeah. better than bein’ in the lab.” He agrees, but…

Oh, that worry in his voice was going to get you worried too.


	96. Wherein Sans Gets in Big Trouble

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I almost made the title "wherein Snas" etc but I figured some people would yell at me so here we are.  
> Also sorry, this chapter really fought me for some reason so it's two days late.  
> Also I love you.
> 
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Sometime later, everyone decides to get out of the water - well, everyone except Undyne and Papyrus, who are continuing their swimming lessons. Papyrus is bobbing vaguely along the top of the water, occasionally flailing with his long limbs, while Undyne roars encouragement. The whole thing looks… oh, exhausting. You always get so sleepy after you get out of the water, you think, stretching out on your warm towel and letting your eyes drift shut. Oh, just ten minutes. Nobody would mind. 

“you gotta put sunscreen on.” A voice interrupts your nap just as you doze off. You roll on your side and look skeptically at Sans. 

“How d’you even know about sunscreen?” You accuse, and he looks up to the sky for guidance. 

“once i figured out there was all these ways you could break you weren’t gonna tell me about, i had to start doing research online.” He insists. You arch an eyebrow. 

“Research.” You repeat, your lips curling into a smile, and he nods quickly, cutting off any jokes you might be thinking of making. 

“yeah. and internet says sunburn gives you cancer.”

“Yeah, but so does like everything else. Besides, not everyone burns-”

“everyone still needs sunscreen. internet said.” Sans insists, and you roll your eyes.

“If I put it on, will you promise to stop googling, like, cancer?” You say, reaching for the bottle. He has to think about this for a second before he gives in and nods. Grumpily (and, worse, knowing he’s right) you begin applying it, grimacing at the cold. 

“want me to do it? i don’t mind.” He offers, and you make a face at him. 

“Nah. I’d better do it. It gets all greasy up in your bones, you know?” You drawl, and Capra, who’s been listening, lets out a sarcastic laugh. 

“Nice try, though, bud.” He says, giving Sans an obnoxiously wide smile (not that Capra knows how to give any other type of smile). You groan - you hate it when Capra gets the last word - and finish halfheartedly applying sunscreen, then, just to show Capra that Sans isn’t in trouble, you scoot back on your towel until you’re next to him, and then shift so you can stretch out with your head in your fiance’s lap. Sans smirks at Capra, then begins running his fingers through your drying hair - which, yeah, he couldn’t have done with greasy sunscreen fingers.

Capra takes this all in with disapproval, then sighs dramatically, staring out at Undyne and Papyrus in the ocean. When nobody registers this, he waits a few seconds, then sighs again, even more dramatically. 

“S-something wrong, Peter?” Alphys asks from her spot under an enormous beach umbrella, glancing up from the papers she’s grading. 

“Uh. Yeah. Your wife said she was gonna teach me magic and now she’s just trying to teach a skeleton how to swim. Totally broke her promise. I was so stoked to learn magic.” Capra grumbles. “Unless you guys wanna start with me, hm?” He looks expectantly over at you. On his other side, Mettaton grumbles and flips onto his side, pointedly not watching while this happens. 

“sure, cap.” Sans surprises you, and you pout up at him, thinking that he’s going to make you move. “you saw what souls look like on camera.” You squint up at him, watching his jaw tighten as he grins a little wider. “tell me what color alphys’ soul is, and we’ll move to the next lesson.” He says, sounding smug. 

“What?”

“Aw, S-Sans, don’t make him stare at me!” Alphys complains simultaneously. 

“yeah.” Sans snickers. “just see a soul on your own, step one, then we can get flashier. an’, hey, you can always stare at mettaton, unless you’ve already seen _his_ soul.” 

“Sans, why.” Mettaton says quietly. Capra sits there, his jaw slack for a moment, then he focuses on Alphys. 

“Sorry, Alphys. I guess I’m gonna be staring at you.” He says brightly. “So. How do I look for a soul?” He looks at you. You make a vague gesture, lifting your head from Sans’ lap. 

“Uh. What did Frisk tell me?” You try to remember. “I mean, don’t look with your eyes. You gotta look with your head and your magic.” You say drowsily. Capra looks at you, deadpan. 

“Look. Without my eyes. Use my magic.” He repeats. “I don’t even know what the hell my magic is! How the hell-”

“figure it out, capra.” Sans laughs. “frisk’s comin’ over later. maybe they can help you out.” 

“Hmph.” Capra says irritably, then shifts his chair so he’s facing Alphys head-on, looking in the opposite direction from the water. It seems like he’s dedicated to doing this. 

“S-Sans, why.” Alphys complains halfheartedly, echoing Mettaton, but eventually, grading papers becomes more important and she ignores Capra’s intent gaze, looking back at her stack of documents. 

“so.” Sans’ fingers resume running through your hair, and you yawn, settling back down and feeling content. Oh, this is so much better than sitting under that stupid camera. If he’d just _touch_ your damn soul, he’d realize that everything was fine. But no, he was too worried about hurting you, like a … stupid jerk, you thought sullenly. Fine. Fine. He was just looking out for you. But you _missed_ him! “undyne’s swimmin’ with paps. l.d. is making sandcastles. and this whole situation is covered.” He makes a broad gesture that manages to take in Capra, Alphys and Mettaton. “so.”

“So. Wedding talk time, huh?” You laugh, turning on your back to watch him again. He laughs and nods. 

“yeah.” He says, his hand stilling in your hair until you whine and he resumes working out the tangles. “d’you know where you want to have it yet?”

“Boring.” Capra calls out, and you turn slightly, leaning over Sans’ knee to glare at him. 

“You’re supposed to be learning magic.” You lecture him, then look back up. “Uh. I mean. I have an idea. We could get a deal, too, if you’re okay with it?” Sans’ eyebrow arches. “Um, you know, the aquarium?” You attempt.

“the place that fired you for havin’ a skeleton arm?” He says, looking highly skeptical. You grimace. 

“Mm, yeah. Also the place that gave me a better job back.” You remind him. “I love it there. And. Sans. Deal. People pay like, fifty thousand to get married there. We could get it basically for free.” You point out. 

“i do like free.” He muses out loud. “i dunno. lemme think about it. i got nothing better.”

“You could get married at EbbCo.” Capra calls out. “Lots of event space.” You bark out a laugh. 

“I feel like you keep forgetting that we all almost died there.” You reply. “Which is honestly astonishing, given that you’re all… you know. Busted up. Also, Capra, concentrate.” 

“Ugh, I don’t even know what I’m supposed to be looking for.”

“A soul, you imbecile.” Mettaton, still looking away, says, absolutely witheringly. “Unsurprising that you don’t know what one looks like, since you barely have one.” 

“hey, be fair. humans usually can’t see ‘em.” Sans chides Mettaton half-heartedly, looking amused. “she didn’t even know she had one at first.” He says, nodding down at you. 

“That’s true.” You chime in. “I couldn’t even see mine, until…”

“Until…” Mettaton groans, and turns onto his other side so he’s facing the rest of you. “You, er, accidentally acquired yourself some skeleton magic, hm?” His lips curl into a mocking smile. “However, Peter’s been going out ‘acquiring’ monster magic since practically the day the barrier came down. And yet - no ‘aha’ moment, no universal language translation, none of the steps that poor _____ had to stumble through. He probably isn’t magic. Or he is, and he’s just dull. If he hasn’t figured it out by now, he never will.” He says cuttingly. Oh, that just seems... unkind. To your absolute relief, Capra bursts out laughing. 

“Jealous much, Threepio?” He drawls, and shakes his head. “I’ll figure it out. I always figure it out, whatever it is. Just gimme time.” Settling back in his chair, he says, “About the wedding thing, you could just have it here. Rent some tents. People love beachside weddings too. Normally I’d think a backyard wedding was gauche, but hey, you’ve actually got some pretty nice digs.” He says with a shrug. “Unless, well, would the neighbors complain?” 

“hmm?” Sans yawns.

“Neighbors.” Capra nods in either direction of the mansion, where, yes, technically there are other houses, though they’re far enough out on either side that you can’t really see them unless you’re specifically looking for them; god, your parents had certainly figured out how to do ostentatious. You’d always sort of wondered why your mom and dad had decided to move somewhere so flashy, but, hey, maybe that was just a CEO of EbbCo thing. 

“I doubt they’d mind. I mean, they didn’t seem to mind when we were getting firebombed by the dudes in black. I think the folks on that side are, like, investment bankers? And I’ve literally never talked to the dude on the other side.” You say with a shrug. “Speaking of which, what’s been happening with the criminal cases for our friends in black? Anyone have any word?”

“Yeah. I do.” Capra pipes up. “Strangest damn thing.” You push up from your comfortable spot to stare at him, and he looks at you with an ironic smile. “All these dedicated anti-monster folks? Seems like a lot of them have been losing their dedication over a month in jail. Lots of attempts to plea, uh, temporary insanity?” He says, looking skeptical. 

“bullshit.” Sans grumbles. “you don’t just uh, lose your mind and decide, hey, let’s burn down some monster buildings and kidnap kids and-”

“Yeah.” You sigh, rubbing your forehead. “But, people will say whatever they think will work to get out of jail, right? God only knows what your dad’s saying.”

“...yeah.” Sans says, after a moment of thought. Capra glances between the two of you, but before he can say anything, Sans snaps, “you’re slacking, bud. close your eyes, try to find a soul.” 

And so the next few hours goes, with Capra growing more and more frustrated that he can’t seem to make a soul manifest (to Mettaton’s distinct pleasure). Ugh, did you need to talk to Mettaton about not being a dick? You’re honestly considering it, but then you see Capra give him a look that threatens trouble, or god, something worse, and you recall that, broken limbs or not, Capra can handle himself. Still, he’s becoming kind of a pain to deal with - he has a thousand questions that you just have no idea how to answer when it comes down to how to view souls, and you’re beginning to think that Mettaton might be right about Capra not being able to use magic. Which, well, you can’t tell him without crushing him. So instead, you snuggle up on your towels next to your snoring fiance and Spot, who’s finally come out of the water and is dripping on you just enough to keep you awake, and you pretend to have absolute confidence in Capra. 

Still. It’s nice when Frisk, Toriel and Asgore arrive to start grilling, and the topic of conversation finally changes. Sure, it becomes necessary to move to a slightly more polite position, but by then it’s getting a little chilly anyway, so you don’t mind putting your t-shirt and shorts back on and going over to help Undyne with the grill once you’ve finished greeting your cousin and their family. God, it feels so good to have everyone back together - this is the first time you’ve all really _hung out_ since the attack under EbbCo, and it’s just nice to have everyone back together. Well, everyone and Capra. Granted, things between you and Asgore are still a little tense - and you notice immediately that nobody, not even Capra, tells the King about the discovery you’d made that afternoon about Capra’s soul - but hey. Maybe this was how things thawed? 

Plus, well, Frisk’s excitement to be at the beach and to finally get to go swimming was contagious. They immediately begin poking around the shoreline, inspecting all the little critters and the gross piles of seaweed, and you’re just about to go down and join them when Asgore and Sans catch your interest - the two of them are talking, which generally just… doesn’t happen. 

“So, Sans, did you find out everything you hoped when you went down to talk to your - to the prisoner?” Asgore is asking. 

“uh. heh.” Sans is already looking at you by the time that you turn completely, bright blue and cringing. Oh, what the hell, Sans?

“Oooh. She looks real pissed. This is gonna be really bad.” Capra tells nobody in particular. You spare a second to glare at him, then grit your teeth. 

“Sans. Come for a walk with me?” You say, immediately clenching your teeth again when you stop talking. He notices, of course - he’s particularly attuned to that tic of yours when you get tense or nervous or angry - and he ducks his head, shrinking under the bemused expressions of your friends. Oh, those are very annoying looks. But, hey, those are not the primary source of your annoyance right now. Nope, your primary source of annoyance is the fact that, once again, Sans has been keeping secrets from you; and this isn’t a little secret! No, this is a big, you went to go see your dad who tried to kill us kind of secret!

“look, i’m sorry-” He begins, the second you’re out of earshot of your friends, but you’re having none of that. 

“You went to visit your… jesus, Sans! We said we weren’t going to talk to him, right? What the fuck?” You’re glaring at him, but you can’t really keep your cool right now. 

“i know, i know. shoulda told you-”

“You shouldn’t have gone!’ You say instantly. “Or, if you really needed to, that should have been a conversation we had together!” He looks up at you, then takes a deep breath. 

“you made it clear that you were done with the topic-”

“Oh, christ.” You look up to the sky for guidance, feeling bitter at the same time that you’re starting to sound like Capra. “Is this a ‘my soul’ thing again? Babe. Just… ugh.” You’d been about to offer for him to just _touch_ it for what felt like the thousandth time, but you stop yourself at the last second, realizing that, at the moment, you are in no mood to be sharing that much with him. 

He seems to process this, his eyes going wide and dim all at once when the expected offer is not extended. He looks hurt enough that you almost want to just back down and say that everything’s fine. Almost. “I don’t want to fight right now.” You finally sigh. “But… look. We gotta talk about this later. That wasn’t cool. Keeping it from me for my own good or whatever. That’s not how this is gonna go, with us.” You say, and turn back to the beach before he can protest (not your most adult move, but, whatever). 

Ugh. Like any _good_ could come out of visiting that asshole, anyway!

But then… well, damn it. You know Sans. And you know that if anyone hates Gaster more than you, it’s him. 

Which means that he’s a lot more worried than he’s been letting on - and he’s been letting on that he’s pretty damn worried. 

Well. That’s not great.


	97. Wherein You Say The Words "Timeline Bullshit" Kind Of A Lot, All Things Considered

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Visit your Trashmom](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)
> 
>  
> 
> [F.art.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

The rest of the evening doesn’t go smoothly. You’re on edge, not in any mood to talk to Sans like nothing at all is wrong, and worse, everyone knows exactly why - except Frisk, but even Frisk can’t help bring up the mood. Eventually they get frustrated enough with the tense feeling surrounding the little barbeque that they wander off to talk to Capra, who perks up noticeably. You watch him start signing, asking Frisk how they’d ended up being able to see souls, and you eventually thaw enough towards Sans to mutter to him,

“Frisk is so much better at magic than me.” Sans eyes you, looking at first like he’s simply relieved that you’re speaking to him, then your words click. Right. Of course Frisk is better than you at magic - they were able to do things innately that you simply hadn’t been able to without Sans’... help. That was a good thing, right? Except, well, Asgore (understandably) didn’t take kindly to human mages in general, and you worried about that more frequently than you liked to cop to. Sans takes a few more seconds to mull this over, watching Frisk and Capra sign to each other distractedly.

“mmm.” He agrees, nearly silently. “kid is… yeah. they’re better at doing stuff than…” He trails off, glancing over at Asgore, and shuts up. You nod after a moment, and turn back down to your hot dog, wishing it didn’t taste so bad to you right now just because you were in a shitty mood. You wanted to be soothed, to be told that everything was okay, but the person who normally did that for you was the source of your irritation all the same. Fuck, couldn’t he just talk to you before he did things like that? It wasn’t good for him to be talking to Gaster, anyone could see that!

It’s very nearly a relief when Asgore, Toriel and Frisk decide to pack up and head home. Papyrus, who has been casting anxious looks between you and Sans for the entire course of dinner, bounces to his feet and offers to escort them to their car. Good. You glance at Sans, trying to avoid making this all too awkward. 

“Help me get this gear inside?” You say, nodding at the leftover food and the towels and chairs. “Cap, you gonna be able to get back in okay?”

“Mhm.” Capra replies distractedly - you realize you’d broken his concentration. “I’m good. Go yell at each other.” 

“Thanks, Capra.” You sigh, and load up your arms with stuff to haul in. Mettaton snorts, but you notice that he doesn’t show any sign of leaving the beach, even though the sun is going down and his solar panel is getting less and less useful by the second. Hm. Maybe those two don’t actually hate each other as much as they seem to want everyone to know. Either that, or… ugh, you know what, you don’t want to think about how they’ve been arranging their trysts before, and this seems like no time to start that line of inquiry. Just go inside, deal with Sans, and forget all of that.

Technically, you suppose, you could just cut a doorway into the kitchen, but you kind of want the short walk to gather your thoughts. Sans glances anxiously at you, then does the same, lagging just a little behind you as the two of you walk across the massive backyard and then into the kitchen. 

“uh.” He finally starts, and you shake your head. 

“C’mon. Upstairs.” You mutter. He manages to meet your eyes as he nods, and you, once again, feel your resolve shifting. Oh, god, he _hates_ this. “I’m not gonna yell. But we need to talk.” You attempt, and he physically cringes. “Oh, fuck.” You groan. “Not like ‘we need to talk.’ Okay? Just like, we actually do need to talk to each other.” 

“...’k.” He sounds relieved, just a little, and you sigh again, shoving the uncooked hot dogs in the fridge and leading the way upstairs. Did he really think this was going to end with you calling things off? Maybe he did. He’d been convinced earlier that you didn’t want to marry him, after all. Ah, fuck, why was it like this? Why did it hurt and make you feel bad even when you were pretty sure you hadn’t done anything too wrong? You just want to fast-forward past all of this, just get to the point where things were okay again, where you got to curl up in his arms and feel secure, like there were no secrets, no questions about whether the two of you were really okay. 

Walking into your room, you immediately flop onto the floor by the side of the bed - you desperately want to just crawl into bed, but you’re still sandy and salty - oh, hell, you were all kinds of salty right now. “Okay.” You sigh, keeping your eyes fixed on him until he settles down next to you. “What the fuck, dude.” 

“look. i know.” He says immediately, like he’s been keeping this bottled in the whole time. “i know. shoulda told you. asked you. i just… i dunno. i got worried.” He sighs, staring at his knees. 

“I know you’re worried, but… Sans, he tried to kill us both, and I know you’re not in a good place to talk to him at all. Like. He tried to kill us. I feel like we kind of joke about that, but that’s a thing that happened?” You say, trying to sound composed. “And he was fucking with your head a long time before that happened. You were a mess whenever you talked about him.”

“i know. i shouldn’t have gone behind your back-”

“You shouldn’t have gone alone!” You cut him off. “Goddamn it, you’re so busy worrying about me that you…” You close your eyes, letting your head lean against the edge of the bed, and focus on your breathing for a long moment. “Are you okay?” You finally ask, the question that’s been itching at you this whole time, that you’ve been too angry to really express. You’re angry because you love him, of course. Because he’d put himself at risk, and because he hadn’t shown any signs of sharing that with you. Because he could have been hurt today, and you wouldn’t have known why, or even had the option of stopping it. 

“yeah. i’m fine.” He replies quietly, after a moment. “he didn’t say anything… i mean, he knew. about your soul.” He manages after a moment. 

“He knew?” You repeat, opening your eyes again to look at him. “How-”

“didn’t ask. realized he wasn’t gonna tell me anything useful, so i split.” Sans sighs. “i’m sorry, babe. i just thought… you were gettin’ so pissed off that i was worried about your soul, and then nothin’ was happening with the wedding, and i figured you’d just be madder if i suggested we talk to him, but…” He trails off and shakes his head. “i was stupid. ‘s hard for me to believe you’re not gonna go, still. i’ve got all these half-memories clattering around in my skull about losing everything, everyone, and then last month, i almost lost you twice in, uh, about fifteen minutes, technically…” He sounds so shaken that you break - you lean against him, and after a moment, your hand finds his. 

“I’m not gonna go.” You whisper after a moment. “I promise. Look, I can take us to Asgore right now, have him say the words or whatever, if that makes you feel more-”

“no.” He groans. “‘m not ruining our wedding ‘cuz i’m… y’know.” 

You do know. 

“Look. Promise me something. From here on out, no secrets. Okay? None of this ‘for my own good’ shit. You might have needed me there, and I didn’t even know.” You reason, working the thought out yourself. “It… it could have been not great, right? I mean. Point one: he fucks with your head, and that’s reason enough for me. I don’t want you getting hurt on my behalf, especially not from that douchebag. Point, uh, two: We've got a cryptic message from... apparently me, in that notebook, saying not to trust ‘him.’ And, you know, if it's some timeline bullshit - and I mean, it is, right? like, that seems like some classic timeline bullshit - then who do we know who's fully engaged in said timeline bullshit and would probably be ultra stoked if we started trusting him?" You point out, raising your eyebrows. 

“yeah.” He admits, and screws his eyesockets shut, thinking. After a moment, he opens them again, and he seems to have found some new resolve. “i trust you, babe.” He says, and very tentatively raises his free hand in a familiar gesture - oh. Oh. He’s looking for permission to touch your soul. You think about this for a second, then incline your head very slightly - the ill will you’d felt towards him from being caught flat-footed by the revelation that he’d seen Gaster has dissipated. Maybe you’re forgiving him too fast, but… damn it, you don’t want to be angry with him, you hate being angry with him! You just want this. “i promise.” He says, after a moment. “no more secrets.”

Exhaling slowly, you nod once more, and allow your vulnerable, slightly transformed soul to be drawn forth. Both of you focus, for a long moment, on that spot of darkness concealed within the shifting flames of your soul. 

********************************************

If this hurts you, he will literally never forgive himself. He will - fuck it, he will go back in time, he’s got a leeway of about five seconds, right, he will go back and do his own “timeline bullshit” and stop it; and he _hates_ going back and changing things, it feels too familiar, too fucked up, too… easy, because if things work the way that Gaster has explained it, then there is a timeline where he still will have hurt you, just like there is a timeline where you have died in the snow, a timeline where you have thrown a spear into a woman’s soul without understanding what you’re doing, a timeline where… 

Stop it, Sans. You say that it’ll be fine, and we’re trusting you, remember? He grits his teeth, just a little, and reaches out, letting his fingers skim over the edges of those curling flames in your soul, and-

Oh, god, he was an idiot, his skull legitimately was empty, because here he’d been, thinking you were falling out of love with him, thinking that you were going to go, and it was right here, just as it always had been, but stronger, so much stronger since that night in the caverns under EbbCo. Fuck, he was stupid! How could he not have seen how much you needed him, how much you shared his fears from that night, how you’d thought for sure that he’d be gone, and then, and then he hadn’t, he wouldn’t reassure you like this, he wouldn’t touch your soul, like it was dirty or wrong or broken or something, after you’d saved him? After you’d saved everyone?

“i’m sorry-” He rasps, his eyes distant and unfocused as he tries to process all this information, but your entire being screams _no_ , your soul demands that he doesn’t wallow, doesn’t - damn it, you needed this. There is a fear - one that feels so much like love that it’s nearly indistinguishable - that’s grown in you this past month, the thought of losing him, of losing everyone, and it’s finally being calmed, and he shudders, your relief licking through him like -

-like a flame, and 

-but something has

Beneath all of the layers of you that he knows so well, the ones he is so intimately familiar with, there is something new. It is not something… it is not wrong or evil. It is simply…

**(power)**

It is a reserve, energy gathered and held into place like a battery holds electricity, like a coiled spring contains kinetic potential. It is not evil, or bad, or wrong. 

But neither is a wildfire. 

That is the magnitude of power that he senses, for just a moment, and then it’s you again, you leaning closer to him, soul flaring brighter, and it is, it’s still you, you were right, nothing’s changed, nothing’s wrong, it’s just you and for a moment, he is so overwhelmed with how much he adores you, how sorry he is, that the charged potential in the center of your soul is entirely forgotten. He kisses you softly, his hand moving over the flames of your soul like he’s stroking a newborn kitten (something so precious, so beautiful, something he needs to be so careful with) and at last you wrap an arm around him, curling close, half in his lap and shaking very slightly, and everything is fine. You love each other, and it’s fine.

“What was that?” You ask, voice scratchy, when he finally pulls his hand away, when neither of you can take anymore. He realizes that you must have felt it too, that well of power deep in your soul, and a part of him feels relief that you understand now, that he doesn’t need to have to try to explain it. 

“i dunno.” He says quietly, and the two of you stay there, still and calm, trying to process all of that. “love you.” He breathes, his arm moving around you. 

“Love you too.” You whisper, tucking your head into the crook of his neck and holding tight to him for a long, long moment.


	98. Wherein Capra Gets Real Creepy With It

“So… like, you’re still here?” He’s a little whinier than he strictly needs to be, but hell, it’s funny. Goddamn it, Peter, stop doing things just because they’re funny, he tells himself strictly, but then he sees the scowl on the robot’s face, and he promptly gives up on that resolution. 

“I am clearly still here.” Mettaton says, as witheringly as he can possibly manage. Capra snorts, stretching his aching leg out as best as he can - fucking casts, fucking fractures, fucking robots taking up half the fucking bed, and seriously, _______’s parents had been loaded, could they really not have sprung for king beds in the guest rooms, because, c’mon, this was ridiculous, full size?! Who even had full size beds? Goddamn, how had he pulled this off in college with that Twin XL bullshit - well, Peter, it was because you had not exactly been the type who had people sharing your bed in college - damn it, you’re getting distracted again. You’re not the type to have people sharing your bed now, either, remember? Focus. 

“Uh… and you’re just going to stay here?” He asks, glancing out of the corners of his eyes at the robot. 

“Find me something better to do.” Mettaton says with a smirk. Capra thinks about this for a second, then groans, rolling on his side so he doesn’t need to look at the stupid beautiful idiot. 

“You know, humans, we do this whole… sleep thing.” He mutters. “And some of us, we don’t so much like people being up in our... area during the sleep thing.” He can feel Mettaton’s eyes boring into the back of his head, and he’s not surprised when the robot lets out a slightly unpleasant chuckle. 

“Oh, Peter.” He says, light and airy. “Who hurt you?” 

Capra grits his teeth. Why did he keep doing this?

“Uh, Sans’ fucking dad, for one.” He says, closing his eyes. “Remember? Being a total badass hero and trying to defend all of monster-kind or something? Hey, Mettaton, you know how you could be a hero right now? Getting off the goddamn bed.” 

Mettaton lets out a soft sigh. He also doesn’t move. Of course he doesn’t. Capra tries to decide if he should make A Thing about this, and then closes his eyes. This has happened before. Sometimes people just set up camp. He’d gotten through it before, he could do it again. At least robots didn’t snore. A few minutes slide by. He tries to sleep. Mettaton is not moving. Like, at all. That’s kind of nice, he supposes. Maybe he’d switched a screensaver on or something. Okay. He could survive this. Maybe he could even relax...

“Peter, I’ve been thinking-”

“Gah!” He doesn’t expect the noise, and reflexively turns to locate the source. Mettaton snickers, then says, 

“Regarding your magic…” He trails off tantalizingly, and Capra’s hand twitches. No. No slapping the robot. 

Maybe just a little?

Focus.

“Yes?” He finally hisses. Mettaton hesitates, but he sounds more thoughtful when he speaks up again. 

“You know, all monsters have different skills when it comes to magic.” He says carefully, after a moment, then falls silent again. Capra gathers that this is supposed to be his turn to say a thing. 

“Oh, yeah? What do you do?” He asks, trying to inject some enthusiasm into the question. 

“Missiles, mostly.” Mettaton says casually. 

“What, really?” Capra says, caught off guard. 

“Yes. Really.” Mettaton sounds amused. 

“Daaamn, Threepio, wouldn’t have figured you for the missile type!” Capra says, his lips curling into a wide smile in spite of himself.

“Oh, and what type would you assume I am?” Mettaton needs to know. Capra grins even wider. 

“Well, you’re fairly gifted at, uh, sucking-”

“Oh. My. God.” Mettaton growls, and sits up. Oh! Is he leaving? That’s good, but-

“Wait. Wait. Tell me the magic thing.” He finds himself saying, though he’s half furious at himself for interrupting what promised to be a dramatic exit. On the other hand, he really wants this information, so… oh, what the hell. Mettaton pauses, looks Capra over for a long, long moment, then raises an eyebrow. 

“Well. You’re expecting to be able to see souls because _______ can see souls. But, what she can do is, er, absorb the gifts of other monsters.” 

“Yeah.” Capra says dryly. “She’s upstairs absorbing some of Sans’ gifts right now, I’d imagine. Jesus, did you even hear them before I switched rooms? There’s a reason everyone else stays in this wing of the house-”

“Do you get this distracted in business meetings?” Mettaton demands. Capra smirks.

“Sometimes. Who cares? I’m the boss. People do what I tell ‘em.”

“You are actually the worst.” Mettaton groans, flopping back onto the bed. Oh, god, no, this was the opposite of progress. But-

“Anyway. So you’re saying that you don’t think I could necessarily do magic the same way as ________? Because maybe seeing souls is like a “her” thing? Well, her and the kid? But I might still be able to do magic, just, uh, different?” Mettaton shrugs. 

“It’s worth a thought.” He says. Damn it. The robot’s not wrong, Capra supposes. He lets this stew for a long moment, then sighs. 

“Thanks, Threep.” 

“Don’t mention it, darling.” Mettaton says, and there is a terrible, awful moment that hangs in the air and almost feels… eesh, fuck, _affectionate_. They both realize it simultaneously, and for a moment, neither moves. Then-

“So I’ll be going-”

“Yes, please, go. Asshole. Go.” Capra doth, perhaps, protest too much. Mettaton bursts out laughing, and stands up, bending over to ruffle Capra’s hair and give him a very condescending kiss on the forehead before he glides out. 

Oh, goddamn it. He’d have to find a way to get back at him for that bullshit. 

\----------------------------

He’s still on edge the next morning. Why does nobody in this house wake up at a reasonable hour? Nobody but Papyrus, anyway. God, he loved Papyrus.

“Okay, bud, what do you have for me?” He asks, hobbling into the kitchen clumsily. Papyrus’ eyes light up as he turns from the stove to see Capra.

“GOOD MORNING, HUMAN!” Okay, so maybe Capra didn’t love the whole, um, maximum volume thing, but - “I MADE EGGS AND BACON AND WAFFLES AND TOAST AND STRAWBERRIES AND COFFEE AND I WAS GOING TO MAKE YOU A BLEEDING MARY LIKE WE TALKED ABOUT BUT SANS TOLD ME THAT YOU’RE NOT ALLOWED TO DRINK UNTIL YOU’RE DONE WITH YOUR MEDICATION!” Ah, damn. 

“‘Bloody Mary,’ Paps.” He says, inching onto the stool at the breakfast bar and carefully balancing his crutches next to him. “Oh well. Thanks anyway, ace.” 

“OF COURSE! ARE YOU FEELING ANY BETTER TODAY?” 

“Loads.” Capra says with a shrug. Well, that wasn’t exactly incorrect. Toriel had hit him with a dose of that good good healing magic yesterday, but healing magic could only go so far. His bones were aching less than usual, and his ribs seemed to be more or less back to normal today, thank fuck. “C’mon, champ, hook me up with some of those waffles!” He urges Papyrus, who is more than happy to oblige. Man, the guy could _cook_ , too! “You ever consider being a private chef?” He asks, raising his eyebrows. Papyrus studies him.

“SANS SAID THAT YOU WOULD TRY TO BUY MY LOVE.” He says cautiously. Capra sighs. 

“Sans says a lot of things.” He grumbles. Man. What was the world coming to when a guy can’t even convince a skeleton to drop his entire life and cook for him? “Well, thanks for cooking, Paps. You’ve got a gift.” He says, spearing a bite of waffle on his fork. Papyrus blushes, and Capra grins to himself. Okay. Still charming. 

“WOULD YOU LIKE TO LOOK AT MY NEW DESIGNS FOR HOME DEFENSE TODAY?” Papyrus inquires innocently, and Capra’s smile grows wider. 

“Hey, bud, you know that I’m not allowed to help you with traps.” That was another thing Sans had been very, very clear about when Capra had moved in. 

(“you’ll literally both kill yourselves by accident and i don’t wanna have to deal with the cops,” was more specifically what Sans had said.)

Papyrus sighs mournfully and nods, and Capra relents. 

“Maybe later if your brother’s not around.” He says with a laugh, stuffing another bite of waffle in his mouth. Goddamn, he was going to get so fat if he stayed around here much longer - his entire regime had gone entirely by the wayside after the hospital, and the food here was so _good_ that he hadn’t managed to care too much. Okay. Stick with one waffle, Peter. He finishes eating it quickly, and pushes himself back up to his feet, grabbing his crutches once more. “Thanks, Paps. Sorry I can’t help with the dishes, but, uh-” He nods at his crutches. 

(‘Sorry I can’t help with the dishes’????! What the _fuck_ was happening to you in this place, Peter!)

“OH! DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT! METTATON WILL HELP ME! WHERE ARE YOU GOING?” Papyrus says sunnily. 

“Oh, up to your brother’s lab to mess with his stuff.” Capra shrugs. 

“NYEH HEH HEH HEH… HE DOESN’T LIKE THAT VERY MUCH.” Papyrus warns, though he seems awfully amused anyway. Capra grins at the tall skeleton and shrugs again. 

“Never told me not to.” He says lazily. “Later, bud.” 

Okay, well, yeah, Sans hadn’t told him not to, because Sans had been, until yesterday, operating under the assumption that he couldn’t get up the stairs, but… well, honestly, that seemed like an oversight on Sans’ behalf. And if Sans and you were still in the romantic throes of… whatever the two of you making up was like (oh, come on, everyone on the beach knew that you and Sans were going to make up like, instantly) - anyway. Best not to interrupt that. Best to just assume that he was allowed to fuck with all the cool shit upstairs. 

It still takes him fifteen good minutes to get up there, but once he’s there, he’s down to business. If that big camera detects magic, well, the odds are good that the other stuff up here has magical implications too, right? After all. There had to be a reason that your mom and dad set up shop here, with this lab just _directly_ due south, across the bay, from the only exposed part of the Barrier, back when that had been a thing? He looks around at all the equipment in the large, circular room, and then stares across the water to Mt. Ebott. Fuck, they must have been able to _see_ the Barrier from here, right, that yellow glow? If he stood right here… 

Yup. Look at that. On the workspace in front of the window with the best view of Ebott, there was, indeed, a dusty set of binoculars. Had you and Sans even wondered about this stuff? Probably too busy being “in love” and “worrying” about each other to even dig into the question of what your parents had been up to, he thinks wryly, grabbing the binoculars and pulling the mountain into focus, studying the crater in the side that the monsters had been tearing out. Yep, the barrier had been visible there, he was sure of it, that’s where the turbine had been… well, hell, time to turn some machines on and see if he couldn’t reverse-engineer what science had been happening up here. He’s in the process of putting the binoculars down when something else catches his eye. 

Something very interesting. 

\---------------------------------------------------

“capra, what the hell are you doing?” Sans demands, pushing the door to the lab open. You stroll in after him and relax slightly - you’d been braced for mayhem, but instead, none of the machines were even up and running. Instead, Capra’s leaning against one of the desks, staring through a set of binoculars out the west window. 

“Birdwatching.” He says vaguely. Sans walks over to the spot next to Capra and squints outside. 

“that’s not a bird.” Sans says after a moment, sounding a strange mix of amused and disapproving. Well, now you have to know. You move to Capra’s other side and follow the line of the binoculars to see-

“Oh my god, Cap, don’t just spy on the neighbors, what the hell!” You exclaim, trying not to laugh. 

“He’s built and he’s doing shirtless yardwork. I’m _going_ to watch.” Capra says. 

“you’re so creepy. that’s so weird.” Sans says, and Capra tears his eyes from the binoculars to look at him. 

“Oh yeah? Is that so, Sans The Teleporting Skeleton? You’re telling me you’ve never creeped on her without her knowing about it?” He says dryly, arching both eyebrows - god, that thick silver-pink scar that slices neatly through his right eyebrow would look so menacing on anyone else, but the jerk manages to make it work for him. “C’mon, Skeletor, spill the beans.” Capra demands. 

“Oh, jeez, Sans didn’t-”

“look, it was _one_ time!” Sans says irritably, and you turn to him, astonished, to see a bright blue blush on his face. 

“Pffft, really?!” You exclaim, absolutely delighted. “Oh my god, how did I not know this?! When? What?!”

“oh my god.” Sans says, burying his face in his hands for a second. “it’s… you remember, uh, way back when we first met? an’, uh, i texted you a whole buncha times and you didn’t write back? so, i, uh… camehereandlookedthroughyourwindow-” He says in a rush, and falls silent as you burst out laughing again. 

“Oh, no, you nerd. Oh man.” You finally manage to say, weakly, your eyes teary with laughter. “Damn, you’re so lucky I’m already in love with you. That’s so creepy.” Sans still looks mortified, so you sidle around Capra to wrap your arms around him, kissing the top of his skull. “Jeez, baby. I appreciate your concern, but…”

“eh, undyne got here first anyway. i was, uh… aware that i was being creepy. just, y’know, i got worried about you…” He says, finally beginning to smile as he sees that you’re not taking it poorly. “anyway it-”

“Shit!” Capra interjects. You both turn to look at him as he whips the binoculars from his face. 

“wha-”

“Oh, damn it, he almost definitely saw me.” Capra says. You wince, and glance out the window. Yup. There is a shirtless man, right by the dividing line between your properties, and he is definitely staring up at the lab. 

“Oh… man, Cap!” You groan. “What the hell, dude? I’ve gone twenty-two years without interacting with this guy and now… oh, goddamn it. It has just been nonsense here for the past month, and this is like, the nonsense cherry on the nonsense sundae! When are you moving back home?” He looks at you, all injured pride.

“Are you… kicking me out? Me? Your best friend?” He asks, and Sans snickers unpleasantly. 

“uh, not sure you’ve earned _that_ particular title, bud.” He drawls. You dart a glance out the window. Yup. Guy is still staring at you. 

“Shit, shit. Capra, go apologize or I seriously will kick you out. This is so awkward. Man, why’d you have to go all Rear Window on me today?”

“I could have stopped a murder!” Capra protests weakly, then sighs. “Fine. What’s his name.”

“Ah, god, I dunno! It’s something fancy I think! Francisco Renaldo? Firenze Rasputin? Fancy Ravensauce?” Sans and Capra both stare at you for a long moment. 

“...Fancy Ravensauce?” Capra demands, as Sans’ brow ridges move ever so slightly upwards. 

“it’s, uh, dennis smith.” He says, trying very hard not to laugh. “we got his mail last week by accident, remember?” 

“Well, I was close - fuck, no this is ridiculous. Go apologize.” You say, before either of them can get you off track. Capra looks at you for a moment longer, seems to understand that you’re actually serious about this, groans, and grabs his crutches, making his way towards the door. Once you hear him thud his way down the first flight of stairs and you’re satisfied that he’s actually doing what you’ve asked, you turn to Sans. 

“...Most people don’t have to put up with this kind of stuff from their boss, right?” You whine quietly. He snickers again, and moves his arms around you. 

“just think what he’d be getting up to if we weren’t keeping an eye on him. ‘s for the greater good.” He says dryly, and nuzzles the tender spot he’d left on your neck last night. You sigh, leaning against him. Oh, you love it when he does that.

“Mmm, are you going to be this cute every time we get in a fight, because, you’re not like… disincentivising me from fighting right now, baby.” You say wryly, and he gives you a look that’s just injured enough for you to need to grin and kiss him apologetically. When he parts from you, the lights in his eyes are bright once more. 

“heh, you gonna make out with me even with, uh, ‘fancy ravensauce’ watchin’?” He teases you, nodding at the window, and you roll your eyes and reach behind him, pointedly drawing the blinds before you kiss him again - not that the guy was still looking up at the lab, he'd gone back to his yardwork, but still. You didn't want to be distracted right now. Oh, as much as you hated fighting, you loved making up with him… 

And even Capra couldn’t spoil that for you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pffft, so I finally put in Fancy Ravensauce... Who is a joke character that is now real because I do what I want. Come to some of [the art streams that Wrexie does with OnaDacora and special guest TST](https://picarto.tv/wrexington) for more of this style of nonsense! We do them Monday, Wednesday and Fridays, and it's great, if you want to listen to two fanfic authors and an artist and a dog and a baby talk about fanfics and also lots of other random shit.
> 
> Also Wrexie is great at art. 
> 
> Also, so are A TON OF YOU NERDS. [So, check out the f.art!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)


	99. Wherein You Meet And Get Jealous At A Bro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Come hang out with me](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [F.art.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> And thank you so much for all of your support, both financial and ridiculous. I love you all. Each and every one of you is a baby angel. Get stoked for 100 chapters.

You can’t make out in the lab all day. Well, it seems fun and all, but it’s Sunday already and you need to get stuff done, because working at the aquarium is hectic (and generally, once you’re done with work, you just want to come home and continue working your way through your parents’ wine cellar while watching bad TV with your fiance). You decide to spend the rest of your day off actually going out and getting stuff done that you’d been putting off - you needed a haircut, some groceries, and - ha, finally! - you were going to pick up a new car you’d found on the local online bulletin board. Sans was not entirely jazzed about that last bit. 

“you really need another convertible?” He demands, looking you over. “or, uh, a car, even?” You poke your tongue out at him. 

“Yeah. I mean, it’ll be way easier to go shopping and stuff. Also… I mean, it seems like the whole world doesn’t know I can teleport, and I kinda want to keep it that way.” 

“ok. but. hear me out. armored suv. maybe a tank?” Sans says weakly, and you chuckle. 

“Mmm, I survived your dad trying to kill us, bonehead. And uh. Doris trying to kill us. And like, four hundred other people trying to kill us. I think I’ll be fine surviving, like, a car without a roof. And if anyone tries to mess with it this time, I’ll send them wildly careening into the void, deal?” 

“no you won’t.” He sighs. “you yell at me when i try to do that…”

“Yeah. Because, you know. The void is a bad place for humans. Regardless. Out of all the threats to my life, I think a soft-top on a car is going to be pretty damn low.” He frowns at that. 

“i hate that you, uh, legitimately might have a list of threats on your life.” He sighs, and you snort and shrug. 

“Comes with the territory, I’m afraid. And, you know, I’m pretty dedicated to this territory. Wed to it, you might say.” He gets a spark in his eyes at that. 

“not yet.” He points out, and you laugh. 

“Fine. Engaged to the territory. You coming or what? You can give the poor dude who’s selling the Camaro a lecture on the importance of my safety, promise.” He has to laugh at that. 

He’s laughing less when he sees the car.

\---------------------------------------

“‘s got a skull on fire painted on the hood!” He complains to Capra, the next morning, over eggs and sausage that he is stubbornly refusing to eat. “like… i dunno, but i feel like that’s offensive, right?” 

“He didn’t even take my business card!” Capra complains back, on a totally different subject, of course. You feel the need to interject. 

“Hey. Sans. I’m sorry that you’re jealous about my bitchin’ new car.” You say with an obnoxious smile. Okay, so it was kind of ridiculous, but it had been cheap, and the metalhead you’d bought it from had just been in awe of you and Sans, and had even thrown in the inspection for free when you asked sweetly enough. 

...And it was black and had a skull on fire spraypainted on the hood. So, it had a lot of things going for it. It was already your very favorite thing you’d ever owned. “Capra… sorry, wait, what are you complaining about?” You continue, after a moment of relishing this fact. 

“The asshole next door! Dennis! Fancy Ravensauce, whatever! He didn’t want my card!” Capra whines. 

“capra, we sent you over to apologize to the neighbor for being a creep, not to try to fuck him.” Sans says, witheringly dryly. 

(Mettaton laughs rather unpleasantly from his perch at the breakfast bar.)

“You don’t understand.” Capra sighs. “This doesn’t happen. Everyone wants my number. I’m great. I’m losing all my edge, living with you idiots.” 

“Well, you know, you could go home.” You point out with a tiny shrug. Capra scowls at you for a long moment, then takes a big bite of eggs, still looking ruffled and offended. You watch this for a while, then burst out laughing and sigh. “Well, you boys can have fun being grouchy at work today. I’ve got super important aquarium management stuff to do.” Sans pouts at you, and you grin at him. “Wanna meet me downtown and grab dinner at Grillby’s after work, babe?” You murmur, leaning over to kiss his forehead. 

“ha, k.” He agrees, looking mildly cheered up. “means you probably shouldn’t be driving that deathtrap, though, right? cuz we’ll get drinks, an’-”

“I’ll drive it to work. Undyne can drive it home.” You say sweetly, your smile growing wider. He groans. 

“fine, fine.” He says, then glances around the kitchen. “where is she, anyway?” 

“Out getting the newspaper.” Undyne calls, trotting into the kitchen with a big grin on her face. “Hey, look what was on the front doorstep!” She’s holding a basket of muffins, wrapped up in fancy ribbon (reading “Made With Love By Muffet’s Bakery!”), with a card tucked into it. Sans takes the card from the basket, squinting.

“security system shouldn’ta let anyone leave anything at the door - oh.” He looks up from the card, looking flustered. 

“What is it, babe?” You ask, moving behind him to read the card. He grimaces. 

“uh. save the date. from. tommy and aaron.” He says, sounding like he’s trying very hard not to be annoyed by this. You shift uneasily. 

“Well, holy shit. That was fast.” Capra laughs. “Christ, what’s the rush? You guys have the right way of looking at it. Drag it out. See if it’s something you really want. Still plenty of time to change your minds-”

“Capra. I’ll literally kill you.” You groan. 

“What?” He says, then glances between you and Sans. “Oh, is that a sore spot? ______ doesn’t have cold feet, does she, bud?” He asks Sans. He looks way too amused by this. Sans opens his mouth to complain, but you get a rush of annoyance at Capra that suddenly clarifies into the perfect way to get back at him. 

“No.” You say clearly, and then grin down at Sans. “We’re holding off because we want _kids_ , Cap. You know. Babies. Little ones. To be a mom and dad. We want to be legally married so we can procreate without any problems.” This isn’t something that you have exactly shared with the, er, rest of the group, and so you’re not at all surprised by the pleased blush on Sans’ face, or the high pitched squeal from Undyne - or even the delighted gasp from Mettaton. These are all bonuses. You’re focusing on the utterly horrified, frozen expression on Capra’s face.

Oh, that is a beautiful expression. He might throw up. This was definitely worth it.

“Anyway. Have a nice day at work, boys.” You say, leaning over to kiss Sans properly. He leans in greedily, but you pull away before he can make too much of a scene. He’s still looking at you like you’re made out of diamonds or something by the time you back away, grinning and flushed, yourself. “Ready to go, Undyne?”

“So, are they going to be like, half human, half skeleton?! How does this even-” 

“Undyne.”

“Fine.” She says, lets out a peal of delighted laughter, and practically pulls you to the garage, where the “deathtrap” is waiting. 

\----------------------------------------

Work is, er, interesting. Specifically because you’re hiring, well, your replacement today. The penguin exhibit is a two person job, and Alphys has strongly, strongly indicated that you should hire one of her undergrad students, at least for the summer. And, well, on paper, he’s perfect. Worked at an aquatics store in high school, bio major focusing in marine and avian biology, high GPA, great references…

It wasn’t at all that you were jealous that someone else was going to be working with Undyne. That was ridiculous. Someone had to take over eventually, and it apparently had to be - 

“Cody Parekh?” You’ve managed to get your office into some kind of order so you can interview properly, and even to set up chairs outside, in the hallway, like you’re interviewing lots of people, or like you’ve done this before. You’re not entirely sure it’s working, but hey, there is a short, muscular, barrel chested guy in the hall wearing a really, really ill fitting suit and looking spectacularly nervous. He bounces to his feet the moment you say his name. 

“Hi! Uh. Yes. That’s me. Cody. Parekh. Cody Parekh.” He says quickly. You look at the extra resumes that are wilting in his nervous grip, and try to figure out what had happened in your life to get you to the position where you need to interview anyone for anything. Oh, this is ridiculous. You _feel_ ridiculous, like this guy is going to point out that you’re barely older than him, and shouldn’t even be interviewing anyone, and -

“Come on in, Cody.” You say, holding the door open. Shit. What interview questions did people ask? There were questions, right? 

You sit down at your desk, and stare at him for a second. He cringes under your gaze, just a little. Oh, god. 

“So. Uh. How do you feel about working with monsters?” You finally manage. He looks at you, bewildered. You absently drum your skeletal fingers on the desk. 

“I, um. Monsters are great? Dr. Alphys is my favorite professor I’ve ever ever had. Ever. She’s the best, bro - Oh no. I mean. Monsters. They’re cool. Like. Really cool.” Cody stammers out, wavering slightly as he starts to drift into the sort of frat-boy patois you maybe wouldn’t have been comfortable with before you moved into a house full of monsters with ridiculous speech patterns. 

“How about penguins?” You say, after a second of watching him squirm. He beams at that. 

“Uh, which type of penguins? I mean, I love them all, but ‘penguins’ is an awfully broad term, considering-”

“Ha! Okay. Okay. Look, uh, Dr. Alphys said you’d be great for the job, so I trust you? Don’t… don’t fuck it up. And be nice to Undyne.”

“Wait. You mean I’d be working with Undyne? Like, _the_ Undyne?” Cody perks up further. You squint at him. 

“Uh. Yeah. You know her?” 

“Oh! I mean, she goes to my gym! And she’s kinda famous for lifting the most!” Cody says excitedly. You take this in for another second, then nod. 

“Yeah. She’s great at that. Just do what she tells you. You’ll do great. You wanna start today?” His eyes go even wider at that, and he nods. You can’t help it. You grin. 

“Hah. Awesome. Okay, then, let me show you where the uniforms and the locker room is. And, you know, get you out of that suit. We don’t need those here.” 

\--------------------------------

Five hours later, you are fully jealous. No joke, no ‘maybe you’re being silly about this,’ you’re just jealous. Undyne and Cody have hit it off like you have never seen anyone hit it off before. Maybe Sans and Capra. Still. Cody is staring adoringly at Undyne even when the last guests have left and it’s time to close up shop for the night for the day shift. You…

It’s fine. 

“Undyne, you gonna take the Deathtrap home or what?” You’re maybe a bit too casual in front of the new hire, but you don’t care, because you’ve been standing at their elbows, waiting, for… forever, while they talk about isometrics and clean jerks and… you don’t even know. 

“Oh. Yeah. Sure! I’m gonna take Cody home though, that cool?” Undyne says brightly. You realize it would be spectacularly petty to say no. 

“Ha. Yeah. Of course.” You toss her the keys, and then wave at both of them. “I’ll… see you tomorrow!” Not at all jealous that they get to do cool shit while you work a desk job. Not at all. Cody beams brilliantly at you, Undyne nods, and you - perhaps foolishly - decide that you don’t need to hide your gifts from _everyone_ , so you slice a quick doorway and step through to Grillby’s, where Sans is waiting, before anyone can say anything.

Sans, at least, is thrilled to see you. “man.” He sighs. “i missed you today. you sure you don’t wanna come back and work with me an’ cap?” 

“Yeah.” You laugh. “I’m sure.” Leaning in close, you kiss him slowly, not caring about the human family walking past (who begin to tut disapprovingly at your display). Finally, you inch away. “C’mon, babe. Let’s grab some burg.” You say, grinning crookedly. 

“heh. burg.” He repeats, and nods at the bouncer as he pushes the door open for the two of you. 

“Sans! _______! What a pleasant surprise!” You hear a voice say almost the instant that you step inside Grillby’s. You immediately tense, your hand reaching for -

no, but that’s stupid. Nobody will hurt you here. But-

“hey grillbz. sorry. shoulda got a reservation.” Sans says with a laugh. You look at him, then at Grillby, behind the bar. 

“Not a problem. Anywhere you like!” Grillby says brightly. 

You can understand Grillby. 

Oh. Fantastic. Another magical change. 

Sans was going to go into a full-on panic about _this_.


	100. Wherein Sans Has Beef

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, c'mon, that's a good chapter title. Happy 100 chapters, you beautiful motes of dust, you sweet tropical fruit and nut trail mixes. 
> 
> [Tumbl along the road.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>  
> 
> [F.art.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

You’re not thrilled to realize that your immediate reflex, upon recognizing that you can understand Grillby, is just… not to tell Sans. Okay. That’s bad. You’d gone on this whole lecture about the importance of honesty and now…

“Thanks, Grillby!” You say, feeling a little dizzy.

“Anytime! Make sure that this guy eats something tonight, huh?” Grillby laughs. Sans glances up at you, clearly considering whether or not he’s going to actually translate that. 

“Oh, I will.” You say, before you can stop yourself. Grillby pauses in the middle of pouring a pint to stare at you. Sans, by your side, does the same. You shift a little, biting your lip. It’s only when the beer overflows and begins to hiss onto Grillby’s burning hand that the bartender moves again, quickly putting the glass down and wiping his hand on a towel distractedly. 

“You can understand fire-speech! How lovely!” He says, and he does, truly, sound delighted. 

“uh. yeah. ‘s new.” Sans sounds... less delighted. 

“Um… new discovery.” You say weakly, shrugging. Grillby looks you over in a way that manages to take in all of you, non-existent eyes lingering on your arm for a second in a way you can just _feel_ , and then he lets out a bright, cheerful laugh. 

“Humans! You’ll keep us on our toes, that’s for sure!” He says, then nods at the tables. “Anywhere you like, you two.” You give him a vague smile, and then allow Sans to tug you off by your hand to the corner booth in the back, which is definitely out of the way. You get the vague sense that you’re in trouble, and you are one hundred percent sure that this isn’t exactly fair. 

“when did this happen?” He demands, the second you sit down. 

“Uh. Just now?” You say, studying his face, which looks awfully grim. “But… I dunno, Sans, like, this isn’t exactly new territory. Remember how I woke up on Christmas and I could understand Frisk? Maybe I’m just getting better at using your magic-”

“it’s not my magic.” He says flatly. You blink at him. 

“...You have no way of knowing that. You can talk to Grillby.” You point out, and he frowns. 

“yeah. because i studied fire-speech for as long as i can remember. s’one of the things my dad was really mad about, that he didn’t manage to transfer that skill when he made me. fire-speech is one of the old, _old_ languages. like, the dawn of magic old. gaster never had to study it, he just understood it, but a lot of monsters…” He takes a deep breath, then takes your hand again. “i don’t like this.” He whispers. 

You think about what he’s saying, biting your bottom lip. “So. Well. I mean.” You finally try out. “Look. We knew that spot in my soul was new after I, um, drained Gaster. It’s no surprise if it’s linked to him. I mean. Sponge, right? That’s what I do?” You ask tentatively. He hesitates, then nods. “So. Maybe I’ve got some Gaster tricks for a while, until I burn the rest of that magic. I mean, Sans, I _do_ run out of magic if you’re not helping. I’ve been there.”

“heh. not that often. i like helping.” He can’t resist a set-up like that. You glare at him playfully for a second, then smile, trying your very best to be understanding of exactly why he’s worried. 

“I know you do. Look. This doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Like. I was there when you touched my soul last night too-”

“oh. shit. d’you… do you think i made this happen? maybe his magic woulda just sat there-” Sans begins, and you groan, squeezing his hand. He’s already scrambling to find a way to make this his fault. 

“If it just sat there, you would have freaked out about it forever.” You remind him patiently. “And like… look. This doesn’t have to be a fiasco. I guess when I think about it, I can feel that I’ve got a lot of power in here. I think. I mean. I don’t know. I honestly don’t feel that different. Like, when I took all that magic from Gaster, it was… insane. A ridiculous amount.”

“yeah. i remember.” He says softly. “your eyes went black and you started floating. hard to forget.” 

“Mmm. Wasn’t my favorite either. But I used almost all of that up getting those assholes out of wherever your dad came from. This is just… I dunno. Soul gunk?”

“soul gunk.” He repeats, browbones raising. 

“Gaster residue. I’ll burn through it and it’ll be fine.” You decide, and nod, trying to reassure yourself that this is the case. He looks sidelong at you for a long moment. 

“k. just. you know.” He takes a deep breath. “my dad wasn’t a cool guy, but he wasn’t about to, uh, kill me. when i was a kid. that’s new. that’s something else that came from whatever black place he opened up in time. and now that black stuff is on your arm and in your soul and i just…” He hesitates, then trails off, shaking his head. “just, uh. tell me. ok? if you start feelin’ different? start doin’ stuff that doesn’t seem like you?” He says, very tentatively. You think about this, then scoot out of your booth seat and stand up, moving to sit next to him instead. 

“...You’ve been worried about this for a while, haven’t you?” You ask. He inclines his head slowly, and you sigh. “I will baby. I promise. I start going mad with power, you’ll be the first to know-”

“-s’not funny!”

“No. I know. It’s not.” You say, then scoop his hand back up, this time inching over just a little so you’re against his side - so he can feel your leg against his, your arms brushing together, and hopefully, so he can feel grounded once more. “I promise. I feel funny, I’ll tell you. But it’s still me in here, okay?” He sighs, and nods. 

“i know. i know it’s you. i’m just… dunno. petrified, i guess. just… uh, you’re the first real thing i thought nobody would ever be able to take away from me, and i’m still… i mean… it almost...” He trails off, and you sigh, and nod. Neither of you were entirely over that night in the cavern. You’d almost lost each other - twice! - and as much as you both just wanted that chapter to be over, for each other to be happy, it kept bubbling back up like a leak that couldn’t be plugged entirely. You’d just been dealing with it in different ways. Sans kept worrying, kept trying to find new threats to keep you safe from, and you…

You kept pretending that you were not at all, in the least, even a little worried about the pitch black fragment embedded in your soul, the one that had flared into a hurricane of power at Sans’ touch last night. 

“I promise.” You repeat. “I’ll keep you posted.” He looks at you, not looking entirely satisfied by that. 

“uh. you’re gonna kill me when i say this...” He finally says, and this time, you know immediately what he’s about to suggest. 

“Hey. If you think we can get something out of talking to your dad, we’ll talk to him.” You don’t even put up a fight, and Sans’ eyes widen, startled by the idea that you’d even propose it on your own. “Look. I get it. He knows more about what he could do than… I mean, than either of us do. We’ll go.” You promise, though you feel queasy at the very thought. You hadn’t ever really planned on seeing Gaster’s stupid face ever again, and now… 

You look at Sans, troubled and doing his best to hide it, and you focus your resolve. “We’ll go. He might be able to tell us what we need to know.” You repeat. 

_Don’t trust him,_ you think. 

\----------------------------

It’s kind of hard to have a nice date after that, but after you pointedly change the subject (and begin rubbing the spot between Sans’ shoulderblades that he likes), he eventually relaxes. Kind of. He still looks anxious when you’re not making him laugh, and he definitely keeps giving your soul darting glances, but… well, at least he’s unwinding a little. After all, you hadn’t been lying. It’s still you sitting next to him, in spite of everything, and he’s terribly fond of you. Fond enough to actually eat an entire burger at your coaxing, which was more than you’d seen him eat in a month, at least. Maybe more. He certainly has more energy an hour or so after he’s eaten - god, add to the list of things you needed to yell at Gaster for the fact that eating seemed to be so unpleasant for Sans, even though he clearly needed to do it!

Still. Energetic, slightly more cheerful Sans is good, and you’re not at all miffed when he suggests that you head home after you’ve each finished your second cider. Except;

“I mean, yes, but can we… I don’t know, I’m having fun hanging out with you tonight. Not you and Capra. Just you.” You say pointedly, giving him a lopsided grin, and the lights in his eyes flare warmer - oh, he likes that. 

“sure. beach? you, me, beach blanket, stars?” He offers, and you grin even wider at him. 

“Sounds perfect.” You agree, and pointedly put enough money to cover your tab and a tip for Grillby down on the table - Sans has a habit of skipping out on that, which you’ve discovered he mostly does because he thinks it’s funny - and stand up. “C’mon, babe. Seriously, let’s just be in the house long enough to grab the blanket. I wanna be outside.”

“i wanna be with _you_.” You’re a little surprised by the vehemence in his voice, and you see, once again, that his gaze has drifted down to where you know your soul to be. For the first time, you really think about this. 

For monsters, you didn’t get much more intimate than sharing your soul with someone. Souls were literally everything. And yours… yours was marked with _something_ that had clearly come from the one person Sans hated most in the entire universe. For Sans, that had to be pretty damn upsetting - after all, you’d never extended that invitation to Gaster, even though you’d done so for him more than a handful of times. Even though you’re not a hundred percent sure of what the implications are for a monster, you’re certain that Sans has every reason not to like it. So when his gaze flicks back to your eyes, bright and intense and needy, you almost immediately reach the conclusion that you’re about to be boned _real_ thoroughly by a skeleton with something to prove. 

Well. That’s kind of a win/win. 

“C’mon.” You say softly, holding out your hand and allowing just enough of a promise into your voice. “Laundry room, then outside before anyone notices us. Er. Unless you wanna check the lab first and make sure that Capra won’t be Rear Windowing again. Did we confiscate those binoculars?” Sans lets out a snort of laughter, but he’s got such a smug look on his face as he processes that you seem to be onboard with his scheme, that you silently pledge you’ll go out of your way, until this whole… ugh, this “black magic” thing is resolved, to show him that you’re still his, no matter what. And hey, if that means that you get a very eager to please fiance, hey, that’s rad too, right?

You step through the doorway you’ve cut into the laundry room, and he follows with a quiet laugh - for a second, all you can see are the lights of his eyes and then the perfect, the… asshole is kissing you already, and you’re just trying to remember that he has pulled cruel tricks on you in this laundry room before and he can not be trusted, when he bites your bottom lip carefully, and you let out a muffled squeak, and - 

“Is that them?” Undyne’s voice sounds urgent and worried. 

Oh, goddamn it. You ease away from Sans, and hesitate, wondering if, uh, it would be so bad to just stick with the plan even though Undyne sounds so worried. Sans is clearly considering this too. He takes a breath, then-

“Is what them?” That’s Capra. 

“Thought I heard a noise. Oh, god, they’re gonna freak out, dude.” Undyne is moving further away from you, but you still don’t like that tone at all. 

“Told you. Call them. He’ll want to know.” Capra says firmly, and you don’t like that either, the resolve in his voice, the uncharacteristic seriousness. 

“I wouldn’t want this over a phone call.” Undyne says - this sounds like it’s been an argument for some time already. Sans is staring at the other side of the door, then, wordlessly, he slices a doorway, glancing at you. For a second, you think he’s ignoring this and just wants to go to the beach, then you realize that the door leads to the foyer, and that he’s simply sparing the two of you the embarrassment of having to clatter out of the laundry room together. Fine. Oh, god, every nerve, once again, is on high alert. You step through, and he follows, then calls out, a strained sounding, 

“hey?” 

There’s the sound of quick footsteps, and then Undyne strides into the foyer, her eye wild. 

“Gaster’s gone.” She hisses. 

\------------------------------------------

“how the fuck did you not have cameras on him?” 

“Sans. I can only apologize-”

“i know you’re old school, asshole, but… i trusted you! i trusted you to keep him in here, and now…” 

You tune Sans and Asgore’s bellowed argument out, staring, instead, through the grate in the cell door. Sans had insisted that you come here at once, and you’d agreed, of course, but now you were here, staring at an empty cell that was still locked up as tight as any cell had ever been. No windows. Just this door, still bolted shut. And… absolutely no Gaster. 

“I posted guards. They saw nothing. Nobody came out of this hall!” Asgore protests - he sounds so sheepish!

“clearly someone did because that maniac is _gone!_ ” Sans snarls. “how’m i supposed to sleep, huh? he tried to kill her! god only knows what he’ll do now, and you just let him-”

“Sans.” You say his name quietly. At once, he’s at your side. 

“‘s ok, babe, i’m not gonna let him-” 

“I know. Shh. I’ll be fine. But… look.” You point through the grate, where you’ve spotted something. Sans had told you that the room was empty, barren, just a cube cut into rock, deep in the underground. And that was almost entirely true, but… 

In the corner of the room, there is a crack. And emerging from that crack, against all odds, without any damn sun… 

A single yellow flower is just beginning to blossom.


	101. Wherein You Have A Slumber Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Pay your respects, kiss my ring.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [I don't know why so many of you did f.art of the shrubberies this weekend but here we are now, this is the world we live in.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

Sans spots the flower a second or two after you do, and he lets out a low (faintly terrifying) growl before stepping forward, slicing a door into the cell and just striding past the door. You follow quickly behind him, trying to stay calm. Sans does not share your concern in that regard. He’s ready to destroy something. 

“you little shit. i knew there was…” He trails off, staring down, then groans. 

“What is it?” You ask, moving to his side, but you’re already understanding what’s happening before you’ve stopped speaking. You’d run into a talking yellow flower before, after all, and Sans had reacted… well, poorly was putting it kind of lightly. But this wasn’t…

“It’s just a flower.” You say, feeling somewhat mystified. And indeed, it is. It’s a cheerful golden flower sprouting from the finest crack in the stone in the corner of the room, but it is, when everything’s said and done, just a flower. You kneel down to examine it, and reach out and touch the barely unfurled petals before Sans can force out,

“babe, don’t-” 

But it’s fine. Nothing happens. You lift the blossom slightly, examining it. “Huh. It’s… dying?” You say, looking closer. The stem, upon closer examination, is a sickly brownish green, and the slight touch from your fingers sends some of the petals fluttering loose and falling on the floor. Sans makes a soft, disgusted sound. 

You hear the clanking sound of keys, and absently, you close the portal that Sans had opened, which must have been in Asgore’s way - it was too small for the king to get through. A moment later, the king strides in, filling much of the empty space in the cell and glancing around. He looks down at the dying flower, and makes a small sound of surprise. 

“How curious.” He says. Sans, who’s still been looking at the flower, glances up, a world of anger on his face. 

“little late for curiosity, pal. you’re gonna find out what happened here.” He begins, and you sense that Sans is about to launch into another argument. You don’t have the energy right now. 

“Sans.” You say quietly, and instantly, his attention is back on you. 

“babe, i promise. i swear on everything that’s ever mattered to me, i’m not gonna let him hurt you.” He says, the earnestness making his voice thick - you’ve only heard him this worked up once or twice before, and then, only then, times where he genuinely believed he was going to lose you. 

“I know, Sans. And I can handle myself okay now. Remember?” He looks you over and then nods. Yes. He remembers all too well. “But… I don’t think this is Asgore’s fault. I mean. None of us can even figure out what happened, right?” He glances at Asgore, then back at you, then grudgingly inclines his head. “Asgore couldn’t have known this would happen. _We_ didn’t know this would happen.” You remind him. “And yelling and freaking out isn’t gonna bring him back here.” 

“yeah. s’pose.” He breathes, then glares at the flower once more. “something’s not right, though. i dunno… i can’t…” He rubs his fingers against his skull, trying to scrabble for a memory that just isn’t there, some insight that might guide him, and then he groans. “well. we need to keep you safe no matter what. if he’s comin’ for anyone, it’s you, babe.” He says. You take a deep breath. You don’t like that, but you suspect he’s right. 

“Well… what are we going to do? I mean, now. In the immediate present. It’s almost midnight. I’ve got work in the morning and so do you.”

“you’re not goin’ to-” He begins, but then, when he sees the _look_ that you’re giving him, he groans. “i know. i know. you can take care of yourself.” 

“Took care of that asshole last time.” You point out, and he lets out a tired laugh. “Look. There’s nothing more we can do here tonight, right? Other than look at this dead flower and feel mad that he escaped?” Sans makes a grudging noise of assent. “So let’s… go home. Get some rest. Tackle this fresh tomorrow.” 

“uh. there’s no way i’m gonna be sleeping with him out on the loose. and there’s still a ton i need to check here.”

“Oh, god, Sans, you can’t just stay up forever. You need to sleep too. You look exhausted. And I’m dead on my feet.” You argue, already feeling like this is something of a lost cause. The odds that Sans will listen to you on this are slim. He’s just looking stubbornly at you, the lights in his eyes fixed in that very annoying way that says he won’t be swayed, when Asgore clears his throat.

“If there is anything at all I can do to help,” He begins, and Sans glares at him, ready to rip into him once more, before something dawns on him. 

“know what? there is.”

\----------------------------------------------  
A half hour later, you are curled into a bed that’s definitely designed only for a small child, and you are fully regretting Sans’ plan. 

“Baby. This is creepy-weird. The weirdest. We should just go home.” You sigh. He squints at you through the darkness. 

“asgore’s got a spare bed. you can sleep, there’s guards at the door, i’ll finish checking stuff out in the cell and i’ll join you. it’ll be fine. safe. promise.” You open your mouth to remind Sans that Gaster had already managed to slip past the Royal Guards once, then think better of it. 

“I still think we should just sleep at home. You said that Gaster was acting saner now, right? I mean, odds are, wherever he is, he’s just off and running, not planning my demise.” Sans inhales slowly at that, and mutters,

“just for now, k? i’ll take off tomorrow, maybe get some sleep then, but you’re-”

“Not going to take the day off, I just got the damn job back-”

“right. so try to get a few hours, babe. i’ll figure something out.” He says, sounding harried. You groan, and glance around the room. It was nice, you supposed, that Frisk had a place to stay while they visited their adopted dad, but something’s off about this too. Sans is watching you closely. 

“All this kid’s stuff in this room… most of it looks really old.” You say quietly. “Did Asgore and Toriel ever have a kid?” Sans blinks at that, not expecting the question, then shrugs. 

“dunno. never asked.” He says. You look around the dim room once again, then sigh. 

“You’re not going to stay up all night pacing that cell, right? You’ll come back here as soon as you’ve done your science or whatever, and maybe we can go home?” You remind him, just to be sure. He sighs and nods. 

“yeah. promise. hour or two, tops. get some rest, babe.” You sigh. You know he’s just trying to keep you safe, but… oh god, you just don’t want this to have happened. You’d imagined your evening together being much more pleasant than this. 

“Check home first. Make sure everyone there is okay.” You mutter. He nods, and moves to the side of the bed to kiss your forehead. 

“will do. gotta get gear from my lab anyway. try to sleep.” He says, and runs bony fingers through your hair, just once. “love you.” 

“Love you too.” You sigh, and watch until he steps through a doorway into nothing and disappears. Okay. Okay. You’ve really got to try to sleep now. You’ve got work in like, six hours, and you were still proving that you were a decent boss in the first place, you couldn’t go in there all groggy and disoriented and acting like your father-in-law-to-be is about to kill you. Just close your eyes. Sleep. 

The minutes tick by. God, what a creepy room. You pitied the poor kid who’d had to grow up here, without sunlight, without… freedom. Why had Toriel never mentioned a child? 

You’re just drifting off, in spite of all the weirdness, when something grabs your attention. It’s a… smell, just sort of hazily hanging in the room. A cloying, floral scent that makes you think of the enormous arrangements at the funeral parlor, the day you’d… 

...and?

...and chocolate?

Suddenly, you feel a great weight pressing down on you. You want to shout, scream, alert the guards, teleport, _something!_ But you can’t even move a finger. You can barely crack your eyes open. Just a sliver, just enough to see something crouching in the corner of the room. To see the shine of red off their eyes.

“Oh, you’re much weaker, aren’t you?” The shape speaks in a thin, cheerful voice. A child’s voice. “That soul. I thought for a moment you were _them_ , but… you can hardly do anything on your own, can you?” Your heart begins to thud in your chest, loud enough that it becomes almost hard to hear the voice. The dark shape creeps closer, red eyes glinting, and you want to scream - fuck, why can’t you move! Why won’t your eyes open all the way? It doesn’t seem to mind that you aren’t responding - it lets out a chipper laugh. 

“Well! That makes things simpler. Although… I can tell. You’re like _them_. Determined. And I can see you’ve already made your choice. How… insipid.” They let out a little giggle. “Humans and monsters don’t work together, you know. Not for long. It’s not in our nature.” The shape is right at your bedside now, a black silhouette - you lash out reflexively, reaching with your magic to find their soul, but… nothing, there’s nothing, there’s no soul and you can’t move, and - “Well. If you’re not smart enough to be on the right side of things, you’ll have to do me a favor.”

The voice is just… it’s wrong. No child talks like this. You know Frisk’s voice so well, the bursts of bright and bubbly energy from your cousin - but no kid says ‘insipid,’ for one. Something is terribly wrong, and you can see it in that red flash in their eyes and you can smell it, and- “Stay. Out. Of. My. Way.” The voice whispers, and a tiny hand reaches towards you, reaching towards your soul, you can just barely make it out in the crack of your eyelids, and the pressure, the weight on you is intensifying and the funeral smell, the sickly scent of chocolate, and-

“_______!” 

The pressure vanishes. Your eyelids fly open and you sit up, your magic flaring up all around you, a wave of purple flames, and then you see Sans, and you let it pass, your magic sinking back into your skin as you stare at him, still sitting up in this little kid’s bed, breathing hard. 

He’s staring at you too, looking just as worried. “What-” You begin.

“you were havin’ a nightmare. never seen you like that before. wouldn’t wake up.” He says, eyesockets wide with alarm. You take a deep breath, look around the room, and make a decision. 

“Screw this. I am going home.” You whisper, feeling damp with sweat and fear and still shaking slightly. He takes one look at you, and nods. 

“k.” He breathes. 

\------------------------------------------

Fifteen minutes later, after a brief apology to Asgore’s guards, you’re home. You’ve told Sans about the nightmare, and he seems shaken, but he mutters; “heard about this thing. well. i mean. i’ve had this thing. sleep paralysis. sounds a lot like what you just had. sucks. but it’s just a dream.”

“Right.” You sit down on your own, familiar bed. “Just a dream.”

“you can sleep. it’ll be ok. i’ll be here to watch you.” He murmurs, nodding at the bed. You grimace and shake your head. 

“You need to sleep too, love.” He makes a face that tells you exactly what he thinks of that. You frown, then purse your lips, trying to think of a solution. Finally, something comes to you. “Spot. She doesn’t need to sleep. Lemme just call her in here, then you can feel better about getting some rest. She’ll keep us both safe.” You whisper. 

He thinks about this for a long moment, then nods. 

“smart. yeah. that’ll work. she’s a good girl. an’ she loves you. she won’t let anyone… especially… yeah.” He seems relieved, and as you trot through the silent house to get her from her spot in the family room, you think to yourself that this is a good thing. He’ll sleep, you’ll both be safe… and that shadowy shape in the corner was just the ottoman, dude, not Gaster or a creepy shadow-kid, so you can just calm your tits right down. Okay. Okay. 

Spot’s delighted to be allowed upstairs, of course - you have to cut a special doorway to the bedroom to let her in, because she’s too big for the door, but she settles right down at the foot of the bed, and her eyes move warily enough as you try to impart to her why she’s here. She seems to understand. 

“Okay?” You ask Sans at last, crawling under the covers and squinting at the clock. Maybe you could get two more hours of sleep. Maybe. He takes a breath. 

“ok.” He agrees, and slides in next to you, holding you tightly. 

He doesn’t fall asleep, of course. 

You know this, because neither do you.


	102. Wherein Capra Grows Weary Of Emotions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Come say hi](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

“Okay. But. I just want to establish that this is absolute bullshit.” 

You groan at him. Of course you do. That’s all you and Sans ever do. Just big dramatic groans and eyerolls and “Capra, no”s, and all those other things that are just... _typical_ from the type of people who have absolutely no sense of perspective when it comes to what’s important. He clears his throat and tries again. 

“Seriously. Your dad escapes and you’re all concerned about getting guards on her. Didn’t even come wake me up when you got back. Sans. He tried to kill me too. Remember? Remember when he tried to-”

“yes. i remember.” Sans sounds exhausted. His eyesockets are half closed and he’s drinking coffee without even the slightest bit of lecturing from you. “he’s not coming for you, capra. he’s got no problem with you, you just happened to be there.” 

Well, isn’t that some shit. “You realize that you were literally risking my life on that assessment last night?” He drawls. Sans’ eyesockets narrow even further, and he rubs his forehead, before muttering, 

“nothin’ on earth could get me to open the door to your bedroom after last time.” 

Okay. Fair point. Capra still glares at him for a long moment, then says, “Well. Regardless. Look at me. What the fuck am I going to do if your dad decides to use me as a scratching post again?” 

You study him blearily over your own cup of coffee. “Babe. He’s right. I can take care of myself, sure, but…”

“well, he’s gotta learn how to use his magic.” Sans says. “wasn’t that hard for you. and he’s not that dumb.” Oh, man, both of you are in very bad moods. He’s never heard Sans sound this grouchy before. He tells himself very deliberately not to take offense. 

“He might not even… ugh. I don’t know. Sorry Cap.” You say weakly. He can guess what that sentence probably ended in. Might not even be magic? Might not even be useful? Whatever. She didn’t know for sure that he couldn’t-

Nah. None of that. Power of positive thinking, Peter. Or some bullshit like that, right? He’d figure it out. He just wasn’t going to risk his life on it. 

“It’s fine.” He finally mutters, but he’s not angry, he’s just… thinking. Thinking hard. “Went thirty-eight years without magic. Can’t start using it as a crutch now. I’ve been… I have some ideas. Personal security. I was thinking about this a while ago, when the men in black started showing up-”

“Men and women in black.” You chime in, and give him a crooked, tired, adorable smile when he looks over at you. Goddamn, he understood why Sans got so worked up about keeping you safe sometimes, you had every potential to be as adorable as a - okay. No. Babysat you. Peter, get your shit together. “And… we really need a better name than men and women in black, anyway. That’s a dumb name.” You yawn. 

“You are so cranky right now.” He points out, and he can’t help but snicker when you stick your tongue out at him. “Sans, you’re taking the day off and working on this with me. I could really use Alphys’ help, too.” 

“hm?” Sans eyes had gone slightly out of focus - or, whatever the fuck those glowy things in his eyesockets were. Why didn’t anyone ask about those? Furthermore, why didn’t anyone ask about the fact that he was currently pouring coffee down a nonexistent throat, and, uh, nobody had to witness the gruesome progress of that through his similarly absent intestines or whatever? 

“How the hell are you drinking that?” He says, then groans and shakes his head. “Wait. No. Wrong question. Or, uh, thing.” Both you and Sans are staring at him with those bemused expressions on her face. Why did everyone look at him like that all the time? “No, okay, lemme try again. Alphys worked on that force field shit for your windows right? I’ve looked at her blueprints. Takes some magic, sure, but thanks to King Asgore, I’m allowed to work with magic. So. Let’s scale that down. Individual level. I wanna just be able to mash a button and be safe from any psychos with four dimensional claw arms, yeah?”

“He doesn’t have those anymore.” You yawn. “He’s just like an elderly skeleton man, right?”

“still got outta there somehow.” Sans says darkly, then nods at Capra. “‘s a good idea. something i’ve been worrying about. she doesn’t have any defensive stuff at all.” He says, nodding at you. Your eyes narrow. 

“I’ve got Spot.” 

“spot’s still technically offensive.” He says with an exhausted laugh. The enormous skull, currently taking up half of the kitchen, grumbles her assent. “and you can’t take her to work. and… hate to say it, babe, but you’re pretty likely to get into some scrapes where maybe stabbin’ someone with a spear isn’t the best solution.” 

You open your mouth to argue, then acceptance crosses your face in slow degrees. “No. You’re right. I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be so argumentative, I’m just…”

“tired.” Sans says, and leans his head on your shoulder, his eyes drifting shut. Capra observes this, running his hand absently through his hair. He still thought it was strange. When did the yelling and sniping at each other start? Normally, there was decidedly more yelling in setups like these, right? For a while, he’d figured that the two of you just argued in private - well, every once in awhile, you actually did argue, he knew that, but every time that happened, next morning, there you both were, bright eyed and chipper and…. ugh, snuggly. It was decidedly unnatural. He’d been so ready to discover what dark secret the two of you were hiding behind this ‘perfect relationship’ facade, but, goddamn it, he was slowly coming to terms with the concept that the dark secret was that… there wasn’t one!

“Anyway.” He says, after a moment. “Wanna work on that with me today, bud? After you sleep.” Sans’ eyes open at that, and one browbone slowly lifts. “A sleepy mind fucks up calculations.” Capra supplies, the corners of his mouth turning up. 

“right.” Sans yawns after a second. “‘s not like you’re worried about my health or anything.” 

“Perish the thought.” Capra laughs. Stupid Sans. Shut up, Sans. And you, you can just stop giving him that knowing smile. Christ. He didn’t deserve this level of nonsense. 

“It’s okay to have feelings, Cap-” You begin, but he’s having none of that. 

“Ssssssssshut it.” He hisses, and curses his damn leg for the thousandth time, for making it supremely difficult to just stand up and stomp off. You begin to giggle, then laugh in earnest - probably too hard for the situation, but it gets Sans going too - the skeleton laughs so hard that eventually he goes silent, just shaking with silent laughter. Capra sits there, waiting patiently for your fit of mutual hysteria to be over. 

“Okay.” You finally wheeze, and then stand with a yawn. “You boys both be good. Do some science. Make some… force fields. When did my life get so weird?” You think about this for a second, clearly, but then your expression turns all fond and mushy again when you’re looking at Sans. He’s just opening his mouth to say something, but you cut him off. “I’ll be safe. I’ll come get you if there’s any trouble at all.” You reassure him. “Get some sleep, okay?”

“k.” He murmurs, and turns his face up for your kiss. 

Capra would never understand you guys. 

\----------------------------------

Okay, but… working with Sans and Alphys on the force field project _did_ kick ass. It was more fun than he’d had in… well, since he’d gotten the okay to lay the wiring connecting the Core to the existing turbine system (and fuck, he couldn’t _wait_ until he was healed enough to actually go poking around in the Core, because the monsters knew their shit, sure, but they weren’t _him_ , they didn’t see some things because it was just simpler for them to use magic…). 

It’s a full day of work up in the lab, once Sans wakes up from a hour long nap, anyway. It seems to be enough, even though he’s obviously agitated. He keeps messing with his damn phone, and then around noon, he just disappears for a half hour. Capra hopes desperately that his spirits will be considerably lifted when he returns, but no, his buddy was still morose, so that hadn’t even been a lunch-time quickie, had it? That had just been… lunch with you. Again, your relationship was inscrutable. 

But then Alphys had showed up, done teaching classes for the day. She’d taken one look at the blueprints he and Sans had spread out, the prototype they were working on, and she’d launched into work. Goddamn, he wished he’d gotten to Alphys before the university had; now there was a brain! When she was focused, he was sure she was thinking circles around him and Sans both, and she moved so damn fast… Well. One thing he’d learned relatively early in life was that there was no point mooning over things that you couldn’t have. And he couldn’t have Alphys at EbbCo. Yet, anyway. He still needed to figure out what made her tick so he could give her that. 

But that was beside the point. By the time you’d come home - swaying slightly with exhaustion, and supported by a worried looking Undyne - they’d made two sets of wearable prototypes. Not bad for a day’s work, right? Then again… with him, Sans and Alphys all working on something with dedicated energy… he felt there was only the limit of _when_ any given thing could get accomplished, not _if_. And hell, it was all worth it to get to show off what they’d managed today. 

“What am I looking at?” You yawn, smiling when Sans strolls over to relieve Undyne of her task of keeping you on your feet. Undyne scowls playfully at him, but releases you. “Mm, hey baby. Missed you.” You add - which Capra figures is _probably_ not directed at him. 

“Missed you too.” He drawls - totally obnoxiously, he knows. 

“Capra, I wasn’t-”

“Check it out.” He thumps the heel of his good leg against the heel of the one that didn’t move so well. From the base of his shoes (god, he was still getting accustomed to wearing these stupid sneakers always, he’d bought them just to mess with Sans and now here he was, wearing black Converse all the time because they gripped the ground better than dress shoes and he tended to stumble - also, well, dress shoes looked stupid with shorts), anyway, distractions aside, from the base of his shoes, a transparent blue shield rises to surround him, just like it was supposed to. Just like he’d - fine, _they’d_ \- designed it to. 

It gets your eyes all the way open, at least. 

“Woah. You’re like… the toy inside a Kinder Surprise.” You mutter. Sans squints at you, browbones raising. 

“... _what?_ ” He demands. You let out a guilty laugh. 

“Oh, uh, they’re these chocolate eggs… never mind. I’m delirious. How does it…” You trail off to yawn. Oh, he doesn’t have time for this. 

“Work? It’s complicated. All you need to know is that you smack your heels together real hard and out it comes. It should be pretty much all you need. We’re reasonably sure it’ll stop a gunshot, or a really hard fall, or energy attacks up to a pretty high threshold. Nobody’s getting in while you’ve got it going.” He says confidently. “Go on. Your pair. Right there. Put ‘em on.” He nods at the other pair of black Chucks sitting on the worktable.

You eye him and Sans dubiously for a second, then turn to Alphys. “Did they…. mmph, sorry, did they do this just so I’d have to join their matching shoes club?” You demand. She lets out a guilty laugh. 

“S-sorry. My idea. I wanted s-something that wouldn’t draw m-much attention, and Peter w-was already wearing them, so…” She shrugs as you take the pair of shoes from the counter and examine them. 

“They’re not gonna like, zorch me or anything if I get them wet?” You say, already tentatively bending down to unlace your shoes. Capra reminds himself very firmly to avert his eyes. No buttstaring from this CEO. 

“Nah.” His voice is a little muffled by the bubble, so he smacks his heels together once more (christ, fuck, ow!) and lets the shield drop. “Circuitry’s all in the rubber, and it’s a magic battery deal anyway. Alphys has been working on making them smaller and smaller.” Alphys blushes - god, she clearly doesn’t get enough compliments for what is obviously superlative work. “One charge on those things should last a decade, at least.” 

“W-we think.” Alphys interjects. 

“The math checks out.” He assures her, smiling brightly, then turns back to you. Oh good, you’ve managed to put them on. Moral butt crisis averted. “Sans, let her go so she can try them.” Sans grumbles but acquiesces, and a moment later, you’ve thumped your heels together and - bloop - force field city. Population, you. Fuck, he was good at science!

“Coooool.” You say through a yawn, then, seeing everyone else looking at you expectantly, you add, “No, it really is cool, I’m just-” 

“beat.” Sans supplies. “ok. awesome. she’s gonna go sleep now. great work team.” 

...Well, okay. That was kind of anticlimactic. Not exactly the shower of praise he’d been hoping for. But… the anxiety he’d been reading on Sans’ face is slowly draining away as the skeleton studies you. And hell, that’s almost better than a shower of praise, right?

Oh, fuck, Peter, you’re going soft. This is ridiculous. You hang around with the Monster Brady Bunch, and this shit… oh, damn, he needed to do _something_ morally bankrupt soon, or he was going to lose all sense of himself. Still, he stands there, looking smug, as you follow his lead and thump your heels together again and the force field fades. Sans doesn’t even bother to wait or apologize - he just makes one of those damn doorways, Capra glimpses the barest flash of your bedroom, and then they’re both gone. End of story. He lets out a snort, then looks at Undyne and Alphys. 

“Uh. Guess that’s dinner for us. Paps home yet?” 

“Mhm.” Undyne nods. “I think he’s already cooking, and I saw Mettaton downstairs somewhere too.” 

Pssh. Whatever. That is of no interest to him. 

“Awesome. Well… see you guys down there, I guess.” He drawls, glancing down at his broken body and reaching for the crutches he’s got balanced against the work table. Alphys grimaces. 

“S-sorry Peter.” 

“Do you need help? I could totally carry you!” Undyne volunteers. He thinks about this for a second, then shakes his head quickly. His dignity couldn’t stand it. 

“Thanks guys. I’ll be fine. Go ahead.” He says, nodding at the door. They glance at each other again, and then Undyne nods, and they both head down the stairs. He follows them… at a much slower pace. They’ve probably reached the first floor before he’s on the landing for the third floor. Stupid… good at walking… jerks…

He’s made it all the way to the second floor when a hard grip encircles his wrist, throwing him slightly off balance. “Ah, fuck you!” He snarls, stumbling, until another hand moves to catch him and keep him steady. Then, before he can even process what’s happening, hard, metallic lips are pressed to his - ah. Okay. Threepio. This is new but - “Christ. You could have made me break another damn bone!” He protests, the second his mouth is free to complain again. Mettaton’s eyes flash (literally! Robots, right?!). 

“Gaster escaped.” He says, awfully quietly. Capra blinks at him.

“Uh. Yes.” He says, feeling dumbfounded. 

“But you’re…” Mettaton meets his eyes for a second, then suddenly releases him. Capra takes a long moment, one in which the robot has almost entirely turned away from him, to figure out the unspoken word. 

“Huh? I’m fine.” He says, his own voice awfully quiet, he can’t help but notice. “Sans is probably right, Threep, I’m not exactly at the top of the guy’s hitlist-”

“That didn’t stop him from doing a phenomenal job of almost killing you last time.” Mettaton says flatly. Capra takes a breath, feeling entirely out of his element. 

“I’m okay. Made, uh, force field shoes.” He says weakly, shrugging. Mettaton glances down at his sneakers, then raises a delicate eyebrow. 

“Of course you did.” He drawls, and is just about to turn away from him once again, when something clearly dawns on the robot. “But… you’re a human. You sleep. What then?” 

Now that is a damn good question that Capra had been doing his best to ignore. Fuck. There _is_ an answer, after all. One that he didn’t, well, _love_ , but it was there. He thinks about this for a very important second, then groans mentally and gives up. 

“Good thing I know a robot who doesn’t sleep, huh?” He mutters. “Just, uh… try not to take up more than half the bed, okay? I don’t look this good because I _don’t_ sleep, get me?” He gives Mettaton a wan smile. He’s already regretting this. Mettaton looks him over, and also seems to be thinking about this quite seriously. 

“Fine.” He finally pronounces. “See you tonight, then.” 

“Like you weren’t gonna anyway.” Capra can’t help but crack, but then, seeing the look on Mettaton’s face, he sighs, and gives him a strained smile. “See you tonight.” 

...This fucking house. It was going to ruin him.


	103. Wherein You Have A Training Montage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Tell me u missed me](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> Also, to those donors who I don't know and therefore couldn't thank personally, my everlasting love and appreciation. Every few dollars goes a long way for this nerd.

The remainder of the week is… subdued. At best. Subdued is actually kind of a nice way to put it - a vague sense of horror hanging over everyone’s heads is probably more accurate, but it seems melodramatic, and the last thing you need is to send anyone - but, um, particularly your fiancé - into a state of concern. By the time Friday’s rolled around, he’s only _just_ started to sleep again for more than an hour or two at a time. And you know for a fact that this is only because there hasn’t been any indication of a threat from his father this whole time - and he knows, of course, because he’s watched all the security tapes for disturbances. Multiple times. 

“something’s still gonna happen. s’not like him to just disappear and not do anything.” He insists weakly, Friday night. 

“You’re probably right.” You sigh. “But we won’t know what that is until it happens. And.. maybe he won’t do anything. You said he sounded, um, saner? When you talked to him in his cell?” You’ve asked him this a dozen times already, of course. It feels like you’re stuck in a loop, all of you saying the same things over and over again. It’s not a surprise when Sans nods and says, 

“yeah. mostly seemed less, uh, murdery. but. who knows with him. i wouldnt’a figured him to actually get violent with you in the first place. that wasn’t really part of the guy i knew growing up. think that came from the place he was stuck in.”

“...Time.” You say, and he shudders. 

“somethin’ like that.” He says, then looks at you for a long moment, surprising you at last when he says, “you’re gettin’ a little stir crazy with all of this, huh?” You blink at him, and then give him a guilty smile. 

“Yeah. I mean. I could stand to do something that isn’t just pacing this house.” He thinks about this for another long moment, then slowly says, 

“wanna. uh. go to the movies? get out of the house for a little bit, do something downtown that’s not work?” 

You try not to make your pleased gasp _too_ delighted. 

“Yes. Please. I will literally see anything. Can we get popcorn?! Oh, Sans, can we take Papyrus, he’s been so quiet since…” You trail off, but Sans’ eyes are bright and pleased that you’d had the thought. 

“sure. i’ve been tryin’ to talk him, but my bro… he doesn’t love the thought that dad did any of that stuff in the first place, and now this… it’ll be good for him to get out and get out of his head.” He decides, beaming at you. You think about this for a second, then sigh. 

“Honestly? It would be good for everyone to get out and just stop pacing the house.” You say. Which, well, would really preclude this from being a night out with just him, but on the other hand, since Papyrus was already coming with the two of you… it would just be good. Undyne had been on edge to the point that Cody, the new hire at work, had anxiously confided in you at your one-week review that he thought Undyne didn’t like him. You’d had to reassure the poor guy that, no, Undyne was just worried about family stuff. 

Alphys hadn’t been faring much better. She’d lost a great deal of the progress she’d been making recently with her stammer, and had gratefully accepted Lesser Dog’s offer to escort her around campus when she was away from home. She kept saying that she knew the odds of Gaster coming after her were low, but… well, Alphys had been kidnapped once before, and it wasn’t a surprise that she was feeling particularly vulnerable. 

And then there was Capra. It seemed that, now that his secret was out, he’d loosened up his concern about who was permitted to see that he and Mettaton were… spending time together. This meant that, just last morning, you’d been startled to see Mettaton emerging from the room Capra had claimed as his own. Mettaton had looked equally startled to see you up and about so early, had stammered something out, and sheepishly retreated back into the bedroom. And then, well, Capra had been in an absolutely foul mood over breakfast - he wouldn’t even _look_ at Mettaton, which, of course, made Mettaton snarl right back at him, and -

Well. It would be good to get everyone out of the house, before someone did something truly stupid as the tension continued to mount. 

\------------------------------

The trip ends up being a total success. It takes some coaxing for everyone to agree, but since Spot and L.D. opt to stay home (er, well, L.D. opts to stay home - Spot doesn’t really have a say in the matter because she certainly can’t fit in the tiny movie theater downtown), you’re not really leaving the place unguarded. You still make sure that L.D. will keep a close eye on Ghost, just in case, and then you’re all off, stepping one by one through an extra large door in the fabric of reality to see the latest Marvel movie. 

It’s good. It’s good for everyone to unwind as much as possible - oh, there’s a little bit of nastiness still; the usual, expected glares directed at your group, the concession guy staring for too long at your right arm, the bickering about seating arrangements in the packed theater - but once the movie starts, that all fades away, and as you laugh and swap giant buckets of popcorn and bags of candy and take in the film, everyone at last begins to relax. 

Papyrus and Sans squabble over the M&Ms - whenever Papyrus sticks his hand out for more chocolate, Sans places a single candy on his palm, which inevitably infuriates Papyrus. It’s good to see them acting like brothers again, you think happily. And there’s Alphys, cuddled right up to Undyne’s side, whispering in her ear whenever a spectacular 3-D effect happens (Undyne, naturally, is kind of getting a bad deal of the three dimensional aspect, but she’s a good sport, even with the glasses over her eyepatch. And… even Capra and Mettaton are being okay. Capra’s got his arm stretched out over the back of Mettaton’s chair, not exactly making contact with the robot, but just once, when you glance over, you notice him absently playing with a few strands of Mettaton’s hair as he watches the film, his eyes glued to the screen. That’s… that’s probably a good thing, right? 

Probably?

You end up not worrying about it; after he bores of messing with his brother, Sans’ free hand moves gradually from your knee to a spot higher on your thigh that promises good, good things for the remainder of the evening. And once you go home, he delivers on that promise, which is certainly preferable to the past week’s routine of being held tightly as he glares into the shadows. This is a _much_ better reason to be sleep deprived. And hey, tomorrow’s Saturday! You can sleep in again!

It turns out the idea that you can sleep in is largely theoretical. In practice, it’s barely eight when you hear a hammering on your door that immediately makes you wince. 

“whaz wrong?” Sans stirs instantly, his arms wrapping tightly around you instinctively - as if Gaster would bother to knock, you think distractedly. If he can escape from a locked cell miles beneath the earth, he can certainly get past the damn armoire in front of the door. 

“Time to get up. I need ______ for something.” That’s Capra’s voice, and fuck, does he ever sound chipper. You’re not ready for this. 

“Oh goddamn it.” You whisper into your pillow… ugh, you feel like, well, shit. It’s gotta be too early, or all the sleep you’ve missed in the past week has finally caught up with you. Sans, ever protective, sees the distress on your face and growls, in a voice Capra’s grown to discover is one hundred percent serious;

“you can bug her for whatever you need once she gets some more sleep.” Spot, hearing the irritation in Sans’ voice, lets out her own quiet growl. There’s a moment where Capra is clearly considering pushing his luck, and then he grumbles, 

“Fine.” Then there’s just the steady thumping of him and his crutches making his way down the hall. You sigh, and try to snuggle back up under Sans’ arm and go back to sleep, but it’s no good. Now that you’re up, you’re up. 

“I’m gonna go see what he wants.” You finally breathe, knowing that he hasn’t fallen back asleep either. Sans sighs, and you feel him nod, his face pressed to your shoulder. 

“k. kick his ass if it’s something really small that coulda waited.” He insists, and you chuckle, turn, and kiss him, ignoring the exhaustion that makes your limbs feel so heavy. Ugh. Normally. you might be a little sore when he gives you a workout like he had last night, but… well. It had been a tough week. 

After you dress and shower, you find Capra downstairs, at the breakfast bar, waiting. He looks thrilled when you walk downstairs, his eyes bright, an empty coffee mug in front of him. You let out a quiet grumble of greeting, grabbing your own mug of coffee - oh, yes, you’ll need lots of this - and eying the quiche on the table greedily. You’re starving. Capra begins before you can even take your first sip. 

“Okay. Movie last night got me thinking. Maybe I’m not like, uh, Scarlet Witch. Maybe for me to do magic, I need something magic to push me into it. Like you with the spear, remember? Maybe I’m like the Hulk.”

“I always kind of saw you as Iron Man.” You drawl, and he scowls at you. 

“Well, he’s not magic at all!” He protests. You think about this, then sigh. 

“So, what, you want me to throw spears at you?” He beams at you and nods. 

“If you would be so kind. I’ve got my badass force field shoes. Chuck some spears at me, and we’ll see if magic comes out the other side.” You grimace at his phrasing, but… eh. He does have the force field. And… throwing some spears at that chipper face does sound pretty damn good right now. 

“Mmph. Fine. Can I eat first?” You ask, rubbing your temple. He nods graciously, and you dig into the quiche.

\------------------------------------

Twenty minutes later, you’re outside, and Capra’s in his little bubble, looking… excited. Anticipatory. Oh, you were going to enjoy working your grouchiness out on that. 

“C’mon! Lay it on me!” He urges, shouting to be heard through the bubble. You laugh, in spite of yourself, and then reach out for a spear. 

Nothing happens. 

“Oh, what the hell.” You mutter to yourself, feeling bewildered. You should be on a, er, full tank! There was no reason for you to not be able to use your magic.

“Something wrong?” Capra calls out.

“Just, uh, give me a second.” You call back, and frown, reaching inside yourself, trying to find that familiar buzz of power. And - oh, there it is, you still had it, you just…

You must be tired. That’s all. Shaking your head at yourself (and feeling thankful that Sans hadn’t been there to see that display of incompetence) you reach out, focus that source of power and grab at -

Oh. Shit. 

You realize the second that you see that blacker than black haze rush down the bones of your arm that you’d made a severe mistake, but at that point, it’s too late. You’ve grabbed a handful of… of the fabric of space itself, and yanked it loose, and like a curtain pulling aside, you have opened a hole that drags at you with a gravitational force that you simply can’t resist - and before you know what to do - before you can even think or cry out or... anything! - you are drawn in, and the curtain slams shut behind you, and you are floating, by yourself, in somewhere… dark. 

Darker. 

Yet darker.


	104. Wherein You Consider That This Is A Pretty Lame Way To Die, All Things Considered

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Express your displeasure with me.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [there is a ton of really good f.art this week and one of it is a capra i drew that looks like archer](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> Oh! And remember, it's a Wednesday, so OnaDacora and I are chattering away like two, um... sets of teeth? Teeth chatter, right? Anyway. While Wrexie does the hard work of drawing great shit like the great person that she great is. [Come hang out with us.](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)

Your first thought, ridiculously, is that Sans is going to have a heart attack when he finds out about _this_ nonsense. 

Your second thought is that you’re probably dead.

You can’t see anything. You can’t _feel_ anything, not even the ground beneath your feet, not even air, not even your own heartbeat. It is a place that is perfectly, absolutely still. 

And dark. 

Dying like this, you think to yourself, is.. well, it’s _super_ anti-climactic. Disappointingly so. After Doris - after _Gaster_ , you’d figured that if you were going to go out this young, it would be in some colossal battle; lives on the line, the future of humans and monsters hinging in the balance, that kind of thing. Not… ugh, messing around throwing spears a thirty-eight year old CEO in your backyard on a bright Saturday afternoon. That was just _stupid_. 

You go to take a breath, then at the same moment you realize that you don’t really need to. Breathing doesn’t seem to be necessary at this place. But. You do still have lungs, you realize… your body _is_ still there, and you’re in it. That doesn’t seem like standard dead person operating procedure. 

You try to move your arm, just to see if you can. Oh, it’s like trying to move through quicksand, but it’s moving. And that means…

Well, dead people can’t move, right?

Okay. So. You’re not dead. That’s step one. Step two, undoing this. There had to be a way out of this, since, well, there had been a way in, right? And now that you’re thinking about it, this place, the still silence, it does feel familiar. Something about the taste in the air (or lack thereof), the darkness…

It dawns on you all at once. 

Oh. Oh you goddamned, fucking… you idiot. You absolute idiot. You know what this is now. Somehow, in your exhaustion and distractedness, you’d tapped into the, the goddamn, the... Gaster magic. The darkness that Sans kept fretting over in your soul, that energy like a hurricane you’d both felt when he touched it, you’d finally used it. And now here you were. Well. Fuck. 

If it got you into this, you suddenly decide, it could get you out. You reach for it without thinking, focusing inside and finding that black place, that well of power and-

OH. 

Suddenly it is no longer dark. 

While you’re focusing on that stolen magic, like the input being changed on a TV, your surroundings snap into view in an overwhelming torrent - there is so much color, so much light, so much noise! You want to plug your ears, close your eyes, block it out even a little, but this isn’t something you’re seeing with your eyes or hearing with your ears, this is just you tapped into the raw source, this is -

Time, it is time, it is-

You are lying there, bloody and broken and falling apart in the snow and-

You are alive and laughing with Sans at a stupid burger pun in Grillbys and-

Papyrus is sitting on a throne in the Underground and-

Undyne is being struck by a bullet, deep underneath EbbCo, and -

Ghost is stretching out in a sunbeam, and-

Capra is walking towards you, tears in his eyes, and-

A tall, elegant skeleton is examining something in the corner of a cell-

You twitch, just a little, recognizing Gaster, and something snaps, and then you are moving, rocketing forward and standing still and everything is shifting and blurring around you and nobody should ever, ever see this much and then:

A curtain parts, and stumbling, you step out of that dark place and collapse onto blessedly solid ground on your knees, heaving for breath, tears streaming down your face as you tremble, trying to get the ground into focus. It’s hard, brown stone. 

“Oh. Goodness.” You jerk your head up at the unexpected, horribly familiar voice. “I did not-t-t expect you so - oh, no, child, don’t-t…” Gaster trails off as you let out a soft, strangled, panicked wail, scrabbling backwards - away from the gaping black hole in reality, away from him, until you’re up against the opposite wall of the cell, still doubled over and shaking, your eyes glued to him as you reach - a door, teleporting, a spear, something, _where the hell was Sans’ magic,_ he’d, last night, he’d, why -

Gaster slowly and carefully holds up both of his hands in a universal sign of nonaggression.

“I’m not going to hurt you.” He murmurs, and it is strange and terrible to hear that voice speaking so calmly, so reassuringly to you. 

“You’re. You’re not supposed to be in here. In the cell. You’re gone. You escaped. You can’t be here-” You rasp out, heart hammering, flattening yourself further against the wall. “HELP! SOMEBODY-”

“Hush-h-h!” Gaster suddenly interjects, striding forward, ever closer to you, and you want to scream louder, but the panic is in your throat now, your vision blurry, and you can suddenly barely make a sound. Gaster casts a quick, worried look at the cell door, and then, still holding his hands up in that peaceful gesture, whispers,

“I understand-d entirely t-that I am the last person you want to trust-t-t-t right now. But you must. For the sake of the entire universe, for everything that is or will be, you must.”

“Please.” You can barely whisper - you are so panicked and disoriented and frightened and lost and _powerless_ \- “Please don’t hurt me.” 

“I will not hurt you.” Gaster replies, just as quietly. “But if you wish t-to continue living, you must-t-t take my hand.” Very slowly, like you’re an animal that is about to startle, to kick out and bite and injure out of blind panic, he reaches out towards you, extending his hand palm up. The last time you’d seen him, those hands had been deadly things, with scythelike claws and wicked intent. Now - 

His hand looks like Sans’. It looks like yours.

“I swear on the sun in the sky. I swear on my own life. On time itself. I will not harm you.” He whispers, when you don’t budge. “But we must move, now, before-” Again, he glances at the door, but now you can hear something too - the muffled sounds of feet on a stone stairway. “Please.” He whispers, and something in his eyes, his expression, it reminds you of his son.

The footsteps are growing louder now, and in those black, black eyesockets, there is just the barest pinprick of light, bright and focused and desperate.

Oh god. This might well be the most foolish thing you’ve ever done. 

You place your bony hand on his. 

Immediately - gently, but with purpose - he pulls you up to your feet, and he strides with you, one, two, three steps, towards, oh god, no, towards that black place where reality is warped, where the curtain is open and the backstage of reality is revealed, and without pausing, without hesitating, he takes that final step. The blackness pulls at you, and then-

You are back in that all encompassing emptiness, stillness, silence, and there is nothing, nothing at all, but-

(Can you hear me?) His voice scrapes against the inside of your skull, bringing back so many memories - the cavern, his insane laughter echoing through your head, Paula’s screams as she died, the smell - and you unconsciously try to protect yourself again, try to reach for your magic, and _again!_ , the lights, the colors, the sound of all of time - 

Undyne throwing a spear at Frisk and-

A small goat monster, alone in a field of yellow flowers, and-

Your father, beaming down at an infant in your mother’s arms, the two of them so young, and-

(No! Do not-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-ttttttttttttt-------)

This isn’t right. He’s stuck clicking in a loop, a broken second hand stuttering over the same instant over and over again, and…

You take a long moment. You concentrate, and let your magic go. The blackness floods back in around you, and his clicking cry in your brain stops. (Good. Yes.) He whispers in your head. (Like that.)

(I want to go home.) You think. (Please. Just take me home.)

(I can’t.) He seems to hear you, even though you are just as silent as he is. (I don’t have any magic. You might recall how that occurred.) For the first time, his voice is hard and somewhat sarcastic in your head, but, after a moment, he tries again, and once more, he has found that quiet, reassuring, slightly didactic tone. (You will need to guide us both, I fear. And quickly. This is not-t-t a place to linger.)

You focus once again, pressing back against your panic and terror, compressing it, storing it away inside your soul for later. He’s surely right. This is not a place to spend any amount of time. This is the kind of place…

It’s enough to almost make you understand Gaster’s erratic behavior, the night he’d tried to murder you. Spending years and years in _here_....

(What do I do?) You finally think at him. 

(Good girl.) You feel the slightest pressure, his bones in your hand squeezing your own in what you think must be intended to be a reassuring gesture. It would definitely be more reassuring without the patronizing expression - you remember that he’d called you Sans’ pet, that night in the cavern, and you wonder what he must really think of you - (You must focus. Before you access your magic. Make a picture in your mind. What were you doing, before you stepped into time?)

You think, trying to parse this question. (I was in the backyard. With Peter. He wanted me to throw a spear at him, and I - I don’t know how I did this. I don’t know why, or how, but I used your magic, and when I tried-)

(Yes. Of course.) He cuts you off. (You must try to remember everything. Where you were standing. Where the sun was in the sky. The smell of the air. The temperature. The feel of the earth beneath your feet. Ground yourself in that place and time. Focus on it until you feel certain of it, and then reach for your magic again.)

(How will I know-)

(You will know.) He assures you. (Concentrate.) 

You concentrate. You think of Capra, in his force field bubble. Of the feeling of the sun on your face. The smell of freshly cut grass from the neighbor’s yard. The grass under your feet. The glare off the ocean in the distance, Mt. Ebott looming behind it on the other side of the C-shaped bay. 

(Okay.) You think at Gaster, and you very hesitantly reach for your magic again, still trying to focus on that one particular point in time. 

The lights, the noise, it comes rushing back in, but this time, it isn’t the chaos of different moments, of timelines spiderwebbing off into infinity. Now, while all that information is still there - while everything that is or ever will be, or ever may be, or ever could have been is spread out all around you, it is no longer all happening to you all at once. Instead, it is forming walls, moving out of your way, creating… a tunnel. It is just another shortcut. 

And at the other end of that tunnel is this morning. Capra, in his force field, just beginning to look surprised. The new summer heat, the smell of grass, the salt air.

(Very good. Now, hold tight to me and step-p-p…) Gaster whispers in your brain. You grit your teeth - the minute motion takes so much effort - and you force yourself forward, the bones of your hand tight against his. It seems to be more intention to move than actual physical movement; you barely move your leg at all, it feels, before once again you are rushing forward, the tunnel of time and possibilities blurring around you until it snaps, and you and Gaster come bursting out into the bright morning and the curtain of time slams shut behind you. 

Twenty feet away, Capra gapes at you. There is a long silent moment, and then you hear Capra, just barely audible from behind his bubble of energy, as he looks at you, then at Gaster, then at you again. 

“Oh. Come on. What the fuck.”


	105. Wherein You Make Gaster Some Tea and a Ham Sandwich and Sans Proposes That You Make a Sex Tape As Well

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Express your continued displeasure with me.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> [Friday is art stream day.](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)

You stand there for another long moment, catching your breath and looking around, your heart thudding with relief. You’re back. You’re okay. You’re back. 

“... _Are you holding his hand???!!!!_ ” Capra demands, still staring at you in absolute shock. You blink, then look at Gaster next to you, immediately dropping his hand as if it had burned you. Gaster is not looking around. He has his face tilted up slightly to the sun, and he is still, his eyesockets closed, just… breathing, as the sun shines down on him. 

In the corner of his eye, that wrinkled, cracked bone - oh, being part of a skeleton family was still strange - there is a single, tiny teardrop, beginning to-

“babe. back up slow.” Sans’ voice makes you jump - you whirl to find him, and see him stepping through a doorway, chalk white (okay, that was normal, but he was _terrified_ ) and supported by Spot, looming behind him. Spot’s eyelights are locked on Gaster, and she is beginning to make a terrifying growl, one that expresses her utter fury at the last time that Gaster had tried to steal you away from her. Gaster turns slowly and takes this in, a look of deep resignation on his face. 

“Ah.” He murmurs, raising his hands very deliberately, palm up once more. That same signal of surrender. “I had wondered…”

“get away from her.” Sans growls simultaneously, and somehow, with all these moving parts, Capra, in his stupid force field, is between you and Gaster, providing a shield and muttering;

“Your shoes, fuck, use them!” He’s almost as white as Sans - he’s shaking, being this close to Gaster, and he’s walked on his broken leg - oh, Capra, you idiot, you stupid brave moron...

“Hey.” You say, very quietly. “Hey. It’s okay.” You back up slowly, all the same, taking measured steps until you’re by Sans’ side. “It’s okay.” You repeat quietly. “He saved me, Sans.” Sans lets out a choked, panicked sound - it’s almost a laugh - and he reaches out instantly, his hand tangling with yours; oh, god, that feels wonderful. You’re so parched for him, for his magic and the feel of him next to you, and you’d been so close to convinced that you might never see him again. You shudder, and you just want to curl up in his arms and let this all be over, but the tension is still so thick in the air, and all eyes are on Gaster, standing there, now fifteen feet from you, looking resigned. 

“what happened?” Sans mutters, eyelights flickering to you for a split second. 

“Your fiancée accidentally used the magic she… confiscated from me.” Gaster decides to speak up, and Spot growls even louder at the sound of his voice. Sans’ father very slowly turns his head to meet Sans’ eyes, and you interject once more. 

“He saved me.” It’s the truth, and for some reason, you need to get that across, because even though everything is soft and quiet and still right now, you know Sans, and you know that Gaster’s life is very much on the line - moreso _because_ of how calm everything is. Sans squeezes your hand, and mutters, 

“how-”

“Look, I don’t know what the fuck happened, we were standing right here, she was just gonna throw spears at me, I goddamn blink, and then she’s there with Grampa Fuckin’ Murderface all of a sudden!” Capra declares loudly, and you can’t help it - of course, from Capra’s perspective, that’s all that happened. That’s it. Oh god. That’s all, and somehow, that’s your limit. You begin, very quietly, to laugh. Sans casts a quick, worried look at you, then growls;

“what did you do to her, you _piece of shit_?!” Gaster seems to be thinking of the right words, but you manage to pull yourself together, you gasp out -

“I time-traveled. I did it. It was an accident. I… oh my god. I was the one who freed Gaster from his cell. Sans. That’s how he got out. He still doesn’t have any magic. It was _me._ He… he only escaped because I needed him to get me home! Oh fuck.” You can’t help it, you begin to laugh again, great big hysterical, relieved, panicked gulps of laughter, and Sans slowly begins to reassess the situation. He moves closer to you, just in time, when the laughter begins to turn into tears, and carefully, he wraps both arms around you, holding you tight as you finally give in and break. 

His eyes don’t leave Gaster, though, and Gaster doesn’t move. He just holds still, his face still upturned to the sun, the wind ruffling the drab gray prisoner’s clothing. Finally, Sans clears his throat. 

“i’m calling the king.” 

“Of course.” Gaster says, calm and restrained. 

“you’re goin’ back to jail.” 

“I understand-d-d.” Gaster replies.

“if you’da hurt her, you’d be dead.” (“Or me!” Capra interjects from his bubble. Sans gives a vague nod to indicate that, yes, this is probably fair.)

“Yes.” Gaster replies simply. 

“He saved me.” You whisper into the crook of Sans’ neck. His arms tighten around you, and he stiffens, then, after a long moment, he sighs. 

“k. c’mon in, dad. we’ll… figure out what to do with ya, until the royal guard arrives.” He says, sounding absolutely bemused that he’s saying the thought out loud. 

“What, seriously?” Capra demands, and then, seeing that nobody is acting like Gaster’s about to lash out and kill anyone anymore, he grunts and lets the force field around him fall. “Typical… skeleton bullshit. I can’t with you guys right now.” He mutters, scooping up his crutch from the ground, and, irritably, he limps in towards the back door, muttering about monsters who don’t know how to hold a damn grudge. Gaster watches him walk in, a mild expression of amusement on his face, and then he nods at Sans. 

“After y-y-y-you.” 

\-----------------------------------------------

The next hour or so is probably the most awkward of your life. Asgore is in a meeting, which means that you, Sans and… Gaster just sit around the kitchen table for a while, waiting for the next thing to happen. Eventually, you can’t stand it - you’ve calmed down enough that you can’t just sit there in silence. 

“Um. I guess I’m making a sandwich. Sans, uh, Gaster, would you like one?” Sans shakes his head. Gaster thinks for a moment. 

“If you would be so kind.” He finally says. You blink - you hadn’t actually expected him to take you up on it. 

“Ham and cheese okay?” 

“That-t sounds lovely.” 

“Okay. Um. Drink?” 

“Some tea, if you have any?” He asks tentatively. 

“Sure. Earl Gray?” 

“Perfect-t-t.” 

You busy yourself for a moment on the other side of the kitchen, then call out, 

“Sugar?”

“oh what the hell.” Sans interjects, sounding weary and a little amused. 

“Son. Don’t be rude. It’s very kind of your fiancée to extend her generosity, particularly given-n the circumstances.” Gaster says at once. Sans stares at him. 

“not uh. as rude as uh. tryin’ to kill us.” He points out quietly. Gaster takes a breath, then buries his head in his hands. 

“I am aware that I behaved abominably. And that there is no ap-p-pology sufficient. Ah, thank you, dear.” He smiles at you when you put the cup of tea down near him, and then, since you don’t know what to do, you … return to the task of sandwich making. 

“well. you gotta admit. seems pretty strange that you’d step in an’ help us now.” Sans points out, leaning forward to meet his father’s eyes. Gaster sighs, and takes a slow sip of tea. 

“I was-s-s a different man.” He mutters. “After spending so long in the fourth dimension. Well.” He stops, and looks up at you. “You’ve s-seen it.” He says, and you nod slowly. “T-tell him what it was like.” He instructs, and, grimacing, you say;

“It was everything. All at once. Everything that ever was.”

“Everything that could ever be.” Gaster reminds you, and you nod. Sans looks between the two of you like he’s absolutely lost for words - one of his hands curls up into a fist for a moment, then he forces it to relax. “It has a structure. When you grow accustomed to it, you can see it. Every timeline has its ebb and flow-w. Every decision a person makes creates a new, infinite universe. And behind the curtain-”

“Everything is happening all at once. Or not happening. Time just... is.” You say quietly, placing a ham sandwich in front of him, then sitting down next to Sans with your own. Instantly, his hand finds yours, holding you tightly. Gaster watches the two of you carefully, and takes another sip of tea.

“When… when time was paused. It…” He finally begins, looking very solemnly at you. For a moment, he can’t seem to find the words.

“dad.” Sans mutters, after a moment. Gaster hesitates, then takes a breath. 

“I paid special attention to your timeline, due t-t-to my interference. I was-s-s mad with lack of perspective, of course. I s-s-saw it all, your pasts, your futures-s-s. My grandchildren and great-grandchildren and hundred-times-great-grandchildren. And when you - when time was frozen - all the branches-s-s, all the futures, an infinite number of lives, it all…” He looks up between you and Sans, and hesitates once more. 

“go on, dad. say it.” Sans says, not particularly kindly. 

“It was all destroyed-d-d-d. They died-d-d.” Gaster says. “T-t-t-time was no longer-r-r certain-n-n-n and the futures-s-s-s. T-th-the lives-s-s-s.” He’s growing distressed, you can see it, and suddenly, you can understand it, him, lurking in all those timelines, and suddenly, unexpectedly in a place where nothing should be unexpected, so much being lost, as your pause sent ripples through all the futures and timelines began to stutter and extinguish, right and left…

“Oh. God. I didn’t think of it like that.” You mutter, and Sans’ grip suddenly grows stronger on your hand, as he demands your attention. 

“hey. no. you didn’t do anything wrong-”

“I-”

“You did not, child. My son is right.” Gaster has regained his composure. “I was mad, and foolish, and corrupted. No person should have the perspective I had, especially not for the duration I did. I lost focus. I lost who I was as a creature with a Soul. And I will pay for my crimes.” He says. Sans grows very still, then glares at him. 

“you’re not foolin’ anyone with this sad old man bullshit.” He growls. “there’s more goin’ on here, i know it. i dunno what, but…” He trails off, and groans as Gaster simply looks sadly at him, taking another sip of tea. “oh, you piece of shit, i’ll figure it out.” He swears. Just then, there is the officious sound of three knocks at the back door - you turn around to see Asgore looming there, flanked by armed guards. “for now, guess it’s good enough to know you’re headin’... home. and this time, i think you’ll stay put.” 

“Indeed.” Gaster stands up slowly, holding out his hands - ready to be handcuffed - as the king walks in. “I will be there when you need me.” He says, and though he’s looking at Sans, you realize that, no, he’s addressing you. 

You wonder, not for the first or last time, what Gaster knows that you don’t. 

\-----------------------------

After the king and his guards have led Gaster away, Sans immediately turns his whole attention to you, (and you to him, of course). You’re exhausted and weary and horrified still, and when he pulls you close, you sag in his arms once again. It takes several hours - and a long, hot bath - before you’ve managed to tell him everything. Or, you think it’s everything. There was so much in that mindbending place, and new fragments of memory keep flickering through your head. After you really, truly have run out of things to say, he makes you climb back into bed, murmuring that you’d been through too much that day, and that you needed to sleep a little. It’s true, you still feel exhausted. 

“Even felt like shit this morning.” You remind him, closing your eyes. 

“hm.” He mutters, a distant look in his eyes for a second, then he’s back to gazing gently at you, his familiar bony fingers combing your still damp hair just how you like. “try to sleep a little, love. i’m worried…” 

“You’re always worried.” You yawn, but this is exactly what you need. You’re aware in a distant sort of way that you’ve been through a huge shock, and god… it feels so good to curl up with him, and just…

When you open your eyes again, the shadows on the wall immediately tell you that it’s late afternoon, and you groan. He jumps slightly - he’s been playing on his phone, but you’ve got his attention the second you make a peep. “hey! you’re up!” He says quickly, and you let out a soft laugh. 

“Mm. Yeah. I’m up.” You agree, blushing slightly as you realize just how much you’d clung to him in your sleep - the fingers of your right hand have slipped under his shirt and are twisted through his ribs, and your leg is tangled with his, and to add insult to injury, there’s a small spot of drool on his shirt from where your head had lay. “Ah, jeez, sorry.” You mutter, trying to disengage, and he snickers and kisses you, taking his time. Ah, that’s better. Your hand falls still, just lingering on his ribs while his tongue tentatively presses against yours, and his body inches, if anything, closer. It’s nearly enough to clear your still fuzzy head. 

“so.” He mutters - his cheeks are tinted with blue when he inches away from you. “i’ve been, uh, thinkin’.” 

“Uh-oh.” You laugh, glancing up at him through half-lidded eyes. 

“uh. about you not havin’ any magic but, uh, his, today.” Sans says quietly, and he’s really, really trying not to sound unhappy when he says that, you can tell. Oh god. Poor Sans. “i uh. i mean, we… i mean. fuck. i dunno what… i mean, i musta done somethin’ wrong, right? last night? if-”

“Babe, I’m… not sure there’s anything to _get_ wrong.” You point out slowly, and he sheepishly meets your eyes. 

“so i uh. had an idea. just to make sure, uh. our whole magic, um. situation. oh god. that um, nothing’s wrong with, heh… i mean… you know. just to make sure. just to uh, have a different perspective. and we could, you know. we’ll uh, erase the tape and it’ll be like-”

“Oh my god.” It slowly begins to dawn on you, what he’s stammering over. “Oh wow. You want to go record ourselves having sex in the lab, don’t you. With the camera that sees magic. So that you can make sure you’re still … oh no. Oh my god.” You can’t help it. You begin to shake with laughter, finally wrestling your hand free from his ribs so you can clap it to your mouth, your cheeks feeling very warm. 

“‘s not that funny!”

“Right now?!” You ask, trying to catch your breath and fight the smile off your face. He winces. 

“just, you’re, uh… magically, uh, defenseless, and- ok. ok. it’s really not that funny.” He demands

“Sans.” 

“...yeah?” He cringes. 

“It’s _pretty_ funny.” You advise him, and he groans, burying his face in his pillow as you scoot out of bed and get to your feet, still laughing. “Okay. Okay. C’mon.” 

“yeah?” He peeks up at you. You grin ruefully, still somewhat in disbelief that this is happening. 

“...Yeah. C’mon. Let’s go…” You trail off, and sigh as the light returns to his eyes, as he processes that you really are serious.  
“Let’s go make a magic sex tape.” You hear yourself say.


	106. Wherein the Concept of 'Whoops' is Explored

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sexual Content warning, pals. 
> 
> [whoops.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>  
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

“ok. i just didn’t really think about how weird this is.” 

You arch an eyebrow at Sans, and he paces an anxious step back to the camera, fiddling with a knob on the display. 

“This _was_ your idea.” You remind him. 

“i know.” 

“Like. You’re the one who suggested it.” 

“i _know_.” He groans. 

“I just don’t know how to talk you through this one, babe.” You sigh, leaning against a cabinet and glancing at the door. He takes a deep breath, and then looks up at the camera, then back at you. 

“just. uh. does it have to be on the _floor?_ ” He complains. You shrug. 

“Unless you know where there’s an air mattress or something. I don’t have one, this house has like a million beds. Do… do you want me to get some pillows or something? I could do that.” 

He glares at you. “you’re being awful cavalier about all this.” 

“Well. Yeah. I don’t, you know. I mean. I’m not having… uh, anxiety? About… um… perfo-”

“it’s _fine_.” He insists loudly, and fiddles (rather unnecessarily) with another knob. You look at him for a long moment. 

“Do you… do you want to do the floaty thing again?” You ask, fiddling your fingers vaguely in the air just in case he doesn’t understand what “the floaty thing” means. He makes a pathetic groaning noise. 

“it just doesn’t feel very… respectful.” He says, finally coming over to lean against the cabinet next to you. “turns out this isn’t, uh, my thing.” You have to laugh at that, though you do your best to make sure the laugh isn’t unkind. 

“Yeah. It’s not exactly my thing either. But… to be honest, I’m kinda worried about the, um, the bit where I don’t have any magic but Gaster’s right now.” You admit. His eyes burn the tiniest bit brighter when you say that, and you remember that this is a particularly sensitive area for him right now. “Be honest. How much does that bug you?” You ask him, leaning against his side. He glances at you, his eyes settling on your soul (or, again, possibly your left boob).

“drives me nuts. i know. don’t wanna be the controlling guy but… that’s _private_ , your soul. it’s supposed to be…” He hesitates, so you complete the word. 

“It’s yours.” You say quietly. He nods at once, looking relieved that you’d completed the thought. He really is worried about coming off as too possessive, but… oh, he must be going nuts, seeing that black flicker in your soul, and worse, seeing you on the display on the camera machine. Normally, your whole body flares up blue and red and purple, your soul and his magic, their constant combination. Right now, it’s just the persistent flares of your soul, and those few tendrils of magic he’s leaving behind that you seem to be starving for; they’re trailing through the air and burying themselves in your soul much faster and more deliberately than normal. “And… oh god. This is embarrassing. I need you, baby. I don’t like feeling like this. I know this is how I felt most of my life, but… it’s better when you’re a part of me. Eesh. Is that too sappy? I just-”

“shh.” He urges, and leans in to kiss you. Oh, he’s still so good at that. But he still seems hesitant, so you have to move over to where his ear would be to murmur, 

“Besides. It’s kind of hot, isn’t it? Having that screen up?” You gesture vaguely at the monitor, tugging him with both hands under the camera as you do so. God, you’re bold tonight! Well… you hadn’t been lying. You feel shitty and empty without his magic - and, god, where had it even gone? He’d been so… thorough, last night! How could all that have disappeared?

“yeah.” He answers your question. “i guess, seein’... i mean, it’s interesting. scientifically.”

“Ooh, baby, you know just how to turn a girl on.” You tease him, making a face. He lets out a laugh, the lights in his eyes flaring. 

“fine. it’s hot. always wondered what you must be feelin’...” He mutters, leaning in to nip your earlobe. You shiver, immediately pressing against him, your hand slipping up under his shirt. God, you’re clingy right now! 

He doesn’t fail to notice. “heh.” He says, in a way that doesn’t mean good news, exactly. “my poor babe. was wondering why you were all over me in your sleep. not that i’m complainin’! just… aw, you _need_ me, don’t you?” He seems to be over his nerves at the thought - he’s no longer looking anxious, instead, he looks thoroughly amused. 

“Sans.” You say warningly, though it’s hard to argue with your hand already all up in his ribs again. 

“poor babe. aw, man. maybe… should we not be doing this?” He says, his browbone suddenly furrowing. Your heart plummets, and he immediately notices. “no… ah, shit. just uh… thought you were kind of too game for the uh, magic sex tape plan. if you needin’ magic is, uh, maybe, uh, affecting your decisions?” He tries half-heartedly. “ok, don’t glare at me like that. i’m tryin’ to be a good guy!” He protests, holding up a hand that just seconds ago had been headed towards your butt. 

“Right now you are being a bad guy.” You grumble. “Don’t make me beg.” 

“you know, this part is gonna be really funny to watch on tape later-”

“Sans.” 

“ok. ok. lemme just… damn it, lemme get a blanket or something. i’m not gettin’ yelled at for rugburn once you’re… heh. two secs.” And very frustratingly, he steps through a doorway and disappears, leaving you alone and… 

Has ‘frustrated’ been used enough yet?

Grumbling to yourself about suddenly-cocky, annoying fiances who didn’t want to share their magic, you very quickly - and irritably - begin to strip down, figuring that he won’t be strong enough to dither much longer if he comes back and you’re already naked. Probably. 

Unfortunately, only you get as far as your jeans - one calf folds up weird and gets caught on your big-ass stupid wool sock. You’re hopping on one foot, trying to yank your stupid skinny jeans off by the time that he returns. 

It is not, precisely, the desired sexy effect. 

He takes one look at you and bursts out laughing, and tosses the blanket haphazardly on the ground before crossing over to you. Before he allows you to free your leg, he kisses you warmly, and inches you over onto the blanket, easing you into a sitting position. He’s still kissing you by the time he starts distractedly freeing your leg from the jeans, but at that point, you’re just limp in his other arm, and he could be leaving the jeans on for all you care, even though that probably won’t make for great, um, TV later… 

Oh, who cares about good TV. He needs fewer clothes on, because you do, goddamn it, you _need_ him. Forcing your eyes back open, you’re tugging his shirt off when you glance back over at the display monitor. You can’t help it. You gasp, and then let out a string of breathless, choked giggles. 

“what?!” He demands, and then rolls his eyes when you nod at the screen.

“Your… crotch… looks like a… laser light show!” You gasp, still shaking with laughter, and he growls playfully, though he can’t keep the grin off his face. He gives your shoulder a nip, his hand sliding between your legs.

“mmm, you’re the one who’s itchin’ for a ride on my-”

“Glowstick!”

“oh my god.” 

“...Lightsaberrr?” You propose, entirely failing to keep the moan out of your voice as he teases you. He moves his mouth from your neck to look seriously at you. 

“you ever say ‘lightsaber’ like that around capra, he’ll jizz his pants.” 

It’s your turn. “Oh my god.” He’s cracking up now - at least until his mouth moves back to your neck. “I can’t believe you jussst… oh.” You lose track of your complaint. He’s _very_ good with his hands. Good enough to make you forget that particular unsettling mental image. Busily, you push his shorts down - it’s a little less spectacular than it is on the camera, but you still will never entirely be used to the fact that your fiancé has a glowing magic dick. You barely have time to admire it, though, before he’s shifted between your legs. 

“Is this, uh… is this the right c-camera angle?” You ask, somewhat hysterically - and trying very hard not to just slide your hips up. He’s pressing against you, but he won’t push inside yet. Oh, he always waits for permission, and you love that! But. Right now… that look in his eyes. Oh, he knows you’re going crazy. 

“should be fine.” He says languidly, an evil, evil smile on his face. Which is saying something, given that he’s a spooky skeleton and all. 

“Sans.” You try your stern voice again. 

“hm?” He tilts his head. Oh, this isn’t funny. You can feel all that magic, it’s so close, and he’s just-

“Don’t. Be. Mean.” You force out. He snickers again, but he still checks your eyes for a second, seriously, before he presses into you - ah, holy… jeez, that was better! You make a noise that’s probably going to be very embarrassing if you watch this back later, and he grunts with satisfaction. He starts off slow - so slow you think he might be trying to make you beg again, but as you stroke his spine and your fingers twist through his ribs, he begins to pick up speed until you’re blissful, just… enjoying every single second of this. 

It takes you some time to come down enough from the high of actually having him inside you again. The dull ache of want in your body has faded, and now you feel as smug and satisfied as you ever have before - this man is _yours_. He’ll always be yours. Your eyes move possessively down his body - or, er, lack thereof, in some places - before you’re drawn to the monitor to the side of you. 

Oh, you’ve never seen anything like it. Your soul is drawing in magic, of course, like a hungry furnace, there’s so much of it flooding into you, but… it’s like even then, it can’t get enough of him. It usually sits just around your heart, but it’s shifted, you can see that in the image, it’s at the center of your chest now, the closest point to him, just the tiniest bit under your skin, like even your soul needs more. And Sans, well… his is just the same, you can see that, like it’s calling out to you, begging to be touched. 

Sans has followed your gaze to the monitor. He likes what he sees, you can tell, his thrusts pick up just a big, making your breath ragged. “can i?” He murmurs, and you let out a;

“Please?” before he’s even finished talking. It’s not like it’s planned or anything. It really isn’t. It’s not like either one of you even moves first. It’s a mutual decision - he reaches for your soul in that tiny space between you, and you move for his, and then, oh god -

They’re touching, your soul is right against his and your fingers are on his soul and he’s caressing yours and -

He’s finishing, and you can _feel_ it, and you’re doing the same, and he can feel it too, you know that, because you’ve got his soul, and for a moment it seems like you might be here for eternity, stuck in that feedback loop of perfect bliss, but then there’s a crescendo, something even bigger - he gasps and you cry out quietly and something stings in your soul, just for a moment, before waves of warm satisfaction ease the sharpness of the wound - and then, slowly, he pulls away, and even slower, he untangles from you and then curls around you, so sweet and protective you want to sob. Something’s just happened that you don’t quite understand, but you love him so much, and whatever it was, it was so _perfect_...

It takes a while before you look weakly back up at the monitor. “I’m blue now.” You observe quietly, a satisfied smile curling onto your lips.

“you sure are.” He chuckles, peeking an eye open. His magic is back inside you now, curled through every square inch of you, and on the monitor, you’re almost as blue as his soul - which is honestly, looking a little faded. Actually, your soul is too. Sans is noticing this now… he’s sitting up, tugging you with him, to look at the monitor. 

“uh.” He says quietly. 

“What - uh?” You demand. He clears his throat, looking at the monitor for a long time - you try to understand what he’s seeing, but all you see is the brightness of his magic in you, the blue getting drawn into your fiery soul. He turns from the monitor to look at you - and again, he’s got that thousand yard stare, the one he generally reserves for when he’s studying your soul/left boob. Except, this time… he’s not looking at your heart or soul or even boob. His gaze is lower. You look up at the monitor again, and at last you see what he sees - lower in your body, the tiniest spot that isn’t blue. And thankfully, not black, either. A tiny, defined speck of green. Which corresponds, of course, to _nobody’s_ soul that you’re aware of. 

Very slowly, with an almost staggering amount of care, Sans’ hand moves over your stomach, resting just below your navel, as he looks up at you with an absolutely hangdog expression on his face. 

“uh ...whoops?” He attempts. 

Oh. 

Oh. 

Whoops. 

You haven’t met the person with the green soul yet.

But you suddenly realize that in about nine months (oh god, probably nine months?!) you’ll be seeing them for the first time. 

WHOOPS.


	107. Wherein Gaster Immediately Begins To Plan The World's Best Baby Shower

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> [Don't forget to come to stream tonight!](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)
> 
>  
> 
> Oh. And, if you feel the need to go out of your way to tell me that you'll stop reading because you don't trust me to do this baby nonsense properly after you've already read 106 chapters of me doing things properly, [let me just get this out of the way here.](https://youtu.be/7VVrQAi9Ycs)

“I thought you said this couldn’t happen!”

“it can’t happen!” 

“Sans, it happen! Er. Happened. Oh my god.” You groan, burying your face in your hands and then looking back up at the monitor. “This doesn’t even make any sense. Look, I know my biology, it doesn’t just work like that, it’s not like boom, sex, pregnant fifteen seconds later. There’s a process.” 

“ok. but.” He nods at the monitor, and you take a deep breath. 

Hello there, green speck. 

“i’m really sorry.” He says helplessly after a moment, and you shake your head slowly. 

“Sans, don’t-”

“i know this wasn’t anything like what we planned and i told you it couldn’t happen and now it’s here and i swear on everything, babe, i didn’t know-”

“I know.” You cut him off again, and rub your brow. “I just need to… think.” 

He settles back, watching you attentively. Every few seconds, though, his gaze darts downward from your eyes. Checking. 

“It’s not…” You try, then fall silent. You don’t know what you’re feeling yet, after all. It’s a big feeling, but… “Okay.” You finally pronounce. “I… god. This is weird. Nobody knows this soon. Like, _nobody._ ”

“uh. monsters do?” Sans says quietly, and you bite your lip. 

“Okay. Well. No human does.”

“yeah. humans aren’t made of magic, so… takes a while for a soul to happen, but…” He trails off. 

“Has this… has this _ever_ happened before?” You mutter, and he grimaces. 

“not that i know of.” 

“So this is totally uncharted waters. Just… flying blind.” You say, absently touching your stomach and then yanking your hand away instantly, feeling unsure. He watches you and cringes at the gesture, ducking his head. Oh god. “Sans. Babe. I just…” You clear your throat. “I don’t want to get my hopes up.” You admit quietly. “We don’t know anything. This could be… I mean, it could be perfect, but also…” 

“hey. ‘s ok.” He says quietly. “we’ve been flying blind this whole time, right? with, uh, basically everything?” You have to laugh quietly at that

“I just… I don’t want to let myself be happy yet?” You say, very slowly and tentatively. “I mean. We… we wanted this. In the future, sure, but… we did. I was already trying to figure out what we would do, since we lived in a world where this couldn’t happen. But. It… happen.”

“-ed.” He completes the thought for you after a moment, letting out a quiet laugh and nudging your shoulder. “look. it’ll be fine. we’ll… take it slow. like you said. we dunno anything. we dunno if this is even something that can… be. an’ i don’t want to see you get hurt if it turns out it isn’t-”

“Think it might already be a little too late for that.” You mutter quietly. He meets your eyes slowly.

“you… uh. you want this?” You inhale sharply, then let out a slightly hysterical laugh. 

“Yes. Yes, shit, I do. I want this. I wasn’t gonna let myself want this because…” You trail off, and look at the monitor again. Just a dot. A green dot that suddenly represents so much more. “This is so weird…” You mutter to yourself, then suddenly swat his arm. 

“hey!” He protests. 

“ _‘Condoms aren’t strictly necessary!???’_ “ You say, quoting him from, god, months ago. It’s his turn to let out a less than controlled laugh. 

“they aren’t! that was magic-”

“It’s all magic!” You protest, trying not to laugh again. You give up, after a moment, and slump, resting your head on his shoulder. “Is it gonna be okay?” You say quietly. 

“i _hope_ so. i dunno.” He breathes, and suddenly his eyes go hard. “i know who does, though.” 

\----------------------------------------------

“Ah! Son. I have to say, I didn’t-t expect you so - oh. Goodness. Both of you.” 

Sans has explained his plan in the few hurried moments while you shower, dress, and quickly cut a doorway to the cells under the palace. This isn’t exactly a sanctioned visit to Gaster, since, well, both you and Sans agree that of all the people on earth you want to tell first about your little… situation, Asgore certainly doesn’t make the cut. 

Then again, neither does Gaster. And yet. Here you are. Outside his cell. Talking to him. 

“dad.” Sans voice is gruff, as if he’s trying not to show his nerves. “earlier. you said something. uh. lot of somethings. one of them being, uh. that. uh.”

“Grandkids.” You supply, when he doesn’t seem to be able to get the thought out. “You said that you saw your grandchildren and great-grandchildren and whatever get uh… you know. That when I paused, their timelines vanished.” Gaster squints at you, looking bewildered for a second. He comes right up to the cell door and studies you for a long, long moment. At last, cautiously, he says,

“Yes. After both... pauses. New timelines formed, of course. Almost immediately, though I fear I was in too much of a rage, when I left time, to wait and see the one we currently reside in fall into place… oh, dear. This remind-s-s-s me, dear, about traveling in the fourth dimension-”

“dad.” Sans demands. Gaster tears his eyes (eyesockets, whatever) from you to look at his son with annoyance. 

“Sans, it-t is _rude_ -” 

“the kids you saw. in those other timelines. are those, uh, _ours?_ ” He demands, looking at you. 

“Well, of course they are, who else would-d-d… ah. Papyrus. Goodness, no. They were yours. But those timelines no longer exist, so… Oh. My.” His eyes open wider. “This isn’t an academic question, is it?”

“Um.” Oh, god, you don’t want Gaster to be the first to know, this is _so_ annoying. “Not entirely academic. No. But. So, based on those other timelines, we can have kids.” 

“ _healthy_ kids.” Sans chimes in. Gaster glances between the two of you, and slowly inclines his head. 

“Yes. Based on the other timelines… there is certainly no biological incompatibility. Or at least, there wasn’t. And I can’t see that changing, based on the past month.”

“dad. _how?_ ” Sans stresses. Gaster glances at him, then shrugs. 

“An excellent question. You never did figure it out before. Maybe you will, this time.” He says, then shrugs. “Or perhaps-s-s not. There are no guarantees. Or.” Suddenly, Gaster is looking directly at you. “There should not be.” He says clearly. You blink at him. 

“Look. I am not great at esoteric warnings. I’m going to need more detail.” You finally drawl - though, you can’t forget the esoteric warning you’d apparently left yourself. His browbones arch slowly, and you think, irresistibly, ‘don’t trust him.’

“If you must-t-t-t travel through time again, you must t-take precautions.” He says, very quietly. “First. You can not change the past.” 

“whattya mean, she did that already, she came and got you, didn’t she?” Sans demands gruffly. 

“She always did that.” Gaster says with a shrug. “She would have changed the past if she refused to take me with her. If the guards-s-s found me in this cell, with her, the results would have been dire. World rending. It would be a timeline ripping itself to shreds, and we would be there, in the present, as it happened. Time does not like change.” He says forcefully. 

“That doesn’t make any sense.” You protest, and Gaster groans. For the first time, his kindly demeanor towards you slips entirely. 

“Then-n-n read a damn book. Figure it out. Try not-t-t-t to fuck-k-k up the universe while you’re at-t-t-t-t it.” He snaps, then blinks, looking somewhat horrified, and takes a step back. You feel - well, god, startled shouldn’t be the right word - he’d tried to kill you! Yet, still, this development is alarming. Sans, on the other hand, looks somewhat triumphant. 

“knew it. knew you weren’t just some old man who loves tea all of a sudden-”

“My sincere aplogies-s-s.” Gaster hisses out the word, though not with malice. “Though. This-s-s does bring me to my s-s-second warning.” Again, he makes sure to lock eyes with you. “You saw what lingering too long in time did to me. You saw what comes of seeing too many futures. What it still does to me-e-e.” He whispers. “Spare yourself the same fate. Never look forward. Only step backwards. And then. Only if you must-t-t-t.” He says, slow and careful. “No person is meant to see so much. It corrupts. It transforms. I was fortunate. You s-scraped that power away from me like the surrounding stone from a fossil, and I somehow persisted. But I am a monster. Made of magic, and gone too far, and transformed too much as it is. You, I fear, would not-t-t be so lucky.” He pauses, and looks between you and Sans. 

“The desire to look ahead is terribly tempting. By coming to me, you have already succumbed.” He says, sounding quite unhappy, then stares at you - through you - for a long moment. “Ah. Green.” He finally says, sounding distant. “You know, I was once… well. The past is the past. And it should remain that way.” He suddenly sounds old and weary and exhausted. “Rest assured, children. Barring the odd twist of fate, this has happened a thousand, thousand times. It-t is unfolding a thousand, thousand different times, right now. In every universe I have peered into, your babe is well, and healthy-y and strong. So chin up.” He says, pacing to a corner of the cell, where the flower had once been growing(? dying?). 

“dad. i uh. thanks?” Sans says quietly, sounding very unsure. Gaster turns to look at him through the grate in the door. 

“If-f-f you truly want-t to express your gratitude. Get-t-t me. A damn. Window.” He says coldly. You and Sans stare at him for a moment, and then Sans snarls, traces a doorway, and takes your hand. You don’t fight him, or thank your soon-to-be father-in-law. You step through the door.  
\---------------------------

After the day you’ve had so far, you’re done with trying to have a normal night. You hole up in the bedroom, and Sans ducks out the door and returns about fifteen minutes later with a pizza box and a bottle of lemon-lime soda. 

“Ugh. Don’t we have any beer? After this day, I could … oh. Shit. Right.” You mutter, glancing down at your stomach. Sans grimaces sympathetically, then says, 

“well. you know what they say. next best thing to beer is, uh, ‘slice.’”

“Oh, what, are we not even getting name brand Sprite anymore?! Capra’s paying for the groceries, it’s the least he could do!” You protest, plopping down on the edge of the bed and grabbing a slice of pizza. “Oh my god, I’m so hungry, I haven’t eaten since breakfast.” You groan, taking a bite, then look up at Sans, who’s just… watching you. “What? Eat!” You say through a mouthful of pizza. He lets out a soft laugh. 

“you’re the best.” He says simply, and plops down next to you, deigning to take a slice of pizza as well - though he instantly begins studying it as if he’s searching for something he doesn’t like, so he can turn it down after a few bites. You groan. 

“You’re gonna have to work on that, you know.” You caution him. “Our kid is gonna get really bad habits watching you.” 

“...’our kid.’” He repeats, trying the phrase out. He looks over at you for a moment, then sighs and takes a bite of the pizza. 

“Yeah.” You say quietly, your head still… spinning slightly, trying to wrap around that concept. You reach out after a second, and cover his free hand with yours. He turns his hand palm up at once, lacing bone through flesh and blood. 

“undyne’s gonna flip. oh, god. paps is gonna lose his damn mind.” He mutters. 

“Oh my god. Sans.” You say quietly, something dawning on you. 

“what?” He looks up, slightly alarmed. 

“...Capra. He’s gonna die.” You whisper. 

It takes you nearly five minutes to stop your hysterical laughter. Somehow, by the time you’ve calmed down, though, you feel confident. 

Everything’s going to be okay.


	108. Wherein You Enjoy A Rousing Game of Golf in Miniature

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [come tell me i'm ruining your ability to self-insert.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>   
> 
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [Still a few hours of stream tonight!](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)

Even though you’d taken a nap earlier in the day, after two pieces of pizza, you realize that you’re exhausted, and, yawning, you stumble over to the armoire and grab some shorts and a tank top to sleep in. Sans follows you with his eyes, smiling slightly. 

“sleepy?” He says, and you laugh, 

“Yeah. I did, um, travel through the fourth dimension and get p...regnant-” You say slowly, not entirely sure that you’ve said that word out loud yet. Sans looks like he’s about to say something, so you charge onwards, quickly changing into your pajamas as you do so. “Anyway. It’s been a _weird_ day.” You understate neatly. “Also, we talked to Gaster twice. And got some time warnings. And Capra convinced me to throw a spear at him. And I was out of magic. And we made a sex tape.”

“ha, ok. ok. weird day confirmed.” Sans laughs, holding up his hands. “look, tomorrow, normal. k? make breakfast, hang out with frisk, maybe watch a movie? that’s a better sunday, right? and, hey, uh, we know where my, uh… where gaster is now. so. what’s left to worry about?” He says optimistically, like he’s trying to sound convincing. 

You stare at him and let out a slightly hysterical laugh. 

“ok. lots still to worry about. we’ll get through it.” He admits, and pulls back the covers, patting your spot in bed invitingly. You yawn, glance at the pizza box, and decide you don’t have the energy to put it away right now. 

“Two seconds. Gotta do human stuff.” You tell him, ducking into the bathroom, and he laughs. He always forgets about that. When you return, he’s in bed, looking at his phone. “Sans.” You say warningly, seeing the slightly distressed look on his face. He immediately glances away, looking guilty. “Are you looking up terrible things that happen to pregnant ladies on the internet?” You scold quietly, climbing into bed. 

“i know. i know.” He sighs, and he curls up next to you, moving his arm protectively around you. You sigh, snuggling up against him, and he shifts a few inches to turn the bedside light off. After a long moment of companionable silence, he speaks, pulling you a little closer. “look. i gotta say this again. i’m sorry. i told you we couldn’t… and it’s so soon, and i know i’ve been rushin’ you with just about everything, i know humans don’t move this fast and if i’m bein’ honest, it’s fast for monsters, too.” He says quickly. You think about this for a second, then slowly, you roll to face him. 

“I’m still trying to get my head around it.” You admit. “But… we _wanted_ this. Okay. Maybe not, like, today. Maybe in a year or two. But we did. I was already… I was already getting ready to try not to be hurt that we couldn’t. To not feel sad when all our friends start having kids of their own. It’s… it’s soon. Oh my god. The wedding.” You suddenly realize. “Oh, god, we need to really start planning. Like, really. Like, really really. Like-” You cut yourself off as he begins to chuckle, and you find the bright sparks of his eyes in the dark, reaching for his hand. “But. Oh god, babe. It’s you and it’s me. How could I be mad at you? How could I be upset about this?” 

The light in his eyes is brighter now, but he still sounds cautious when he speaks up. “people are gonna talk. you think people were mean to you with the arm, that’s nothin’.” He cautions. “people will be awful.”

“What else is new?” You sigh, then look seriously at him. “I’m happy.” You finally whisper. “It’s gonna be a lot, but, god. I’m so happy. We’re going to have a kid. By this time next year, they’ll be here with us.” He takes in a quick (maybe a little panicked) breath at that, but he nods quickly. You study him for a moment, trying to make his face out in the dark. “Are you happy?” You finally ask. He takes a second before he answers. 

“i. uh. i never thought… i didn’t even want to hope.” He says slowly. “i mean. i just wanna do this right. i raised paps, but i was a kid myself, you know, and, uh, it was the best thing i’ve ever done, but… s’ not the same. this is _ours._ ” He says, and his voice sounds a little rough. “i just… oh, man. i’m out here, and i found you, and we’re gonna have a kid. our kid’s gonna grow up knowing the sun and the stars and the wind, and they’re gonna have a mom and dad that loves them, and they’ll never, ever have to question that. course i’m happy. happy’s not a big enough word. i dunno if there’s a big enough word. i… ‘s like my soul’s on fire. it’s so much more than i deserve.” He says, and you realize that he’s crying, just a little.

“No it isn’t.” You say quietly, tucking your head under his chin and holding yourself to him. He inhales shakily, and hugs you tight for a moment.

“i love you so much.” He murmurs. 

“I love you too.” You mumble, lips brushing against his clavicle. There’s another moment of silence, then he says, 

“...ok, but we’re brushing pretty much over the whole ‘you travelled through time’ thing, huh?”

“...Pretty much.” You agree with a soft, worried laugh. 

“but we can freak out about that later? we get to just be happy tonight?” He checks. 

“Please?” You murmur, and he chuckles quietly, still holding you close.

For tonight, you get to be happy.

\-----------------------------------

“So. You agree, we’re not, um, telling the world yet?” You ask Sans the next morning, and he nods quickly. 

“yeah.” You glance down at your stomach, craning your neck. 

“Like. Nobody’s just going to notice, right?”

“not for a while. not unless they’re uh, lookin’ for soul number two. i mean, it’s still just tiny.” It really is. It doesn’t even have a shape yet, it’s just this little speck of light that’s apparently taken up camp in your uterus. Because _that_ makes sense. 

Well, if you start trying to apply logic to any of this, you’ll probably lose your damn mind. You’re carrying a _skeleton’s_ child, after all. Logic went out the window months ago. “Okay.” You sigh, smoothing your shirt anxiously. “Alright. Wow. Ready?” You hover by the bedroom door, waiting for his response. He looks you over, then lets out a quiet laugh. 

“almost.” 

Once he’s done kissing you, you reluctantly push open the door, take his hand, and lead the way downstairs, like nothing’s changed. Just a normal Sunday.

“ **!!!!** ” A cry of excitement sparks suddenly in your head as you enter the kitchen, and you grin as Frisk tears across the room to tackle you, giving you a quick, enthusiastic hug. The kitchen is busy this morning - Toriel, Papyrus, Mettaton, Undyne and Alphys are all seated either at the kitchen table or the breakfast bar, in various stages of eating.“ **Mom says we could go to the mini-golf place if you say it’s okay! Hi, Sans.** ” 

“hey kiddo.” Sans leans over to ruffle Frisk’s hair. “what’s that about mini-golf?” Toriel clears her throat, looking embarrassed. 

“Er. That is not exactly what I said, Frisk.” She says scoldingly. Frisk shrugs, unapologetic. “Frisk has seen advertisements on the television for miniature golf? It seems there is a place in town where they have built a game where you play a tiny version of golf in a place decorated like the ships of seafaring criminals?” 

“Oh! Yeah. Pirate’s Haven. I used to love going there when I was a kid!” You laugh. “We should totally go there. I don’t want you guys to get bored of the beach! Did you have mini-golf in the underground?”

“kinda.” Sans laughs. “ _snow_ way it’s good as what’s up here, though.” You don’t get the joke, but Frisk cracks up as Papyrus begins to groan his displeasure. “where’s capra? seems like something he might want to get in on?” Without meaning to, you glance at Mettaton, since, well, he’s the most likely person to know. Undyne speaks up first, though. 

“Oh, you missed it! Toriel used her healing stuff on Crapra and his bones are all patched up now! He went up to Sans’ lab to try and cut his casts off!”

“Oh! Well, that’s awesome. Good for him! I guess he can go home now!” You laugh, and then cringe when Mettaton shoots you a very unhappy look. “Or. Um. Not. He could I guess. Stay. Here?” You attempt vaguely. 

“S-sans, what’s the matter with you? Y-you look like you’ve seen a h-human.” Alphys asks, her brow furrowed. You turn to your fiancé, amused by the turn of phrase, and see that he does look awfully alarmed. 

“i um. should go up and check on him. might cut his leg off or something.” He says hurriedly. You squint at him, since this doesn’t exactly ring genuine, and he meets your eyes, raises his browbones and adds, “or, uh. get into something that he shouldn’t. notes or, uh, tapes or something.” 

Your heart plummets as you think of the machine upstairs, the VHS tape still sitting inside. 

“Yup! Go!” You chirp, and then try to shrug off all the confused looks you’re getting from all the other monsters as Sans quickly cuts a door to the lab and ducks out. “So.” You say, grabbing a muffin and sitting down at the table. “...Minigolfing.” 

“Yup.” Undyne raises an eyebrow. “...You’re not going to explain what that was about?”

“Nope.” 

“Okay.” She shrugs, and turns back to her waffle. 

\------------------------

An hour or so later, you’re all making your way onto the first hole at Pirate’s Haven. To your slight surprise, Capra has joined your group on this trip - you’d been half sure that he was going to take the first opportunity to go off and be… Capra by heading down to the Cock and Bull or something, but Mettaton had chided him when he came downstairs. 

“Oh, Peter won’t want to come, he’ll just stay behind and spy on the neighbor again.” He said very dryly. Capra had shot him a withering look. 

“I’m coming. Minigolf is fun. Besides, if she-” he jerked his head at you, “- decides to get sucked into time again, I wanna go with her. Always wanted to time travel.” 

“I’m not going to do that.” You’d warned him, but you couldn’t keep the relieved smile off your face - Sans had shaken his head at you behind Capra’s back to confirm that no, he hadn’t been watching your, er, home movie. 

And now here you all were, watching Frisk line up their shot, their little tongue stuck out in concentration as they squinted at the hole. Oh, this was going to take ages. Still, you didn’t quite mind. You leaned casually against a wall (next to an animatronic pirate that kept waving a jolly roger flag) and watched as Sans crouched next to Frisk, giving them tips in a very convincing caddy impression. Oh, that was cute. He was so good with Frisk. He would be-

“My dear, I wonder if we might talk?” 

“Gah!” You jump, turning to look at an apologetic Toriel. God, how had she snuck up on you? You hadn’t even noticed her, and she was all of eight feet tall! “Oh, jeez, Tori. Sure.” 

“I wonder…” Toriel says, very tentatively. “If perhaps you might have… good news to share?” She gives you a meaningful look, and your face heats up spectacularly. Oh god, no. Not here. Mettaton and Capra are just feet away - Capra’s poking Mettaton’s pointy shoulderpads, grumbling that they’re going to take his eye out. 

“Um. Do you want to take a walk with me?” You say quietly, hoping that she’ll catch the desperation in your tone. “It’ll be forever before it’s our turn, anyway.” 

“Ah.” She understands. “Yes, of course. Would you like to walk onto the, um, the replica mercenary ship with me?” She nods at the tacky fake pirate ship that’s been built to look like it’s floating in dyed-blue pond water about twenty feet away. It has a rope bridge that can be crossed so people can take souvenir photos on the ship. You wonder for a second if the bridge can hold both you and the queen, then you shrug the thought aside and nod. 

“Sure!” Sans gives you a questioning look as you stroll off with Toriel, but you give him a quick nod. _Everything’s okay._ He shrugs at you, then resumes his caddy routine, now joined by Papyrus who is shrieking conflicting advice at Frisk. Undyne and Alphys have wandered away to peer for goldfish in the murky blue water, and Mettaton and Capra have pulled off to the side a little - Mettaton’s murmuring something in Capra’s ear that’s made the other man smile very, very obnoxiously. 

Which leaves, of course, just you and Toriel on a fake pirate ship. 

“How did you know?!” You say quietly, eyes wide. “We weren’t telling anyone yet!” Toriel puts her hand awkwardly to her mouth. 

“Oh, dear. I forgot. Humans do not generally share this news so quickly, do they?” She looks very embarrassed now. 

“...No. We don’t.” You say softly. “How could you tell? Did you - can you see it?” You force yourself not to look down at your stomach as you ask this. Toriel shakes her head. 

“No. Just. Your face. Watching your hus- oh, my. Your, er, _fiancé_ with Frisk. A mother can always tell.” She says softly. “This is such wonderful news.” Suddenly, worriedly, she glances down at you. “It is wonderful news, yes?” She checks, and you give her a quick, anxious smile. 

“Yes. The best.” You assure her quickly. “We just… didn’t know it was going to happen. This has all sort of caught us by surprise.”

“Right. Of course. That happens to humans, I have heard.” She says thoughtfully, though now she can’t keep a big, delighted smile off her face. 

“Tori?” You realize suddenly that this might be your best chance to ask this. “You remember before the war, right? Do you know about this ever happening? Between a human and a monster?” She thinks, then shakes her head. 

“No. Although, I was very young, and the war by that time had driven humans and monsters so far apart that… it would have been unthinkable.” She says quietly, then looks at you, resolutely. “But things are different now, and here you are, proof.” Her eyes are full of determination. You think on this, then swallow. 

“Yeah. I suppose so. But, Toriel… can you please keep this quiet? Just for a while, until we figure out what to tell people?” You beg, and she nods quickly. 

“Of course. I am… I am so pleased for you, my niece. For you both.” She says, looking across the small pond at Sans, smiling again. You sag slightly with relief. You’d imagined this conversation going so, so much worse. She hadn’t even said anything about magical ejaculation, which was something of a miracle, all things considered. Although, replaying what she _had_ said, you realize something that you’d been meaning to ask her.

“Tori… you said that you knew, as a mother. Did you… I mean. I’m sorry. This is really overstepping. But… did you have a kid? Before Frisk?” You ask quietly. She hesitates only for a second. 

“I had two.” She says, and her tone tells you all you need to know about the fate of those children. Her grief is heavy and obvious. 

“Oh, god. Toriel. I’m so sorry-” You begin, but she shakes her head, reaching for her necklace and unfastening it. After a second, you understand why - she’s produced a large, heart shaped locket from beneath her dress. She opens it, and hands it to you. 

There are two pictures inside. 

One is a goat monster, like Toriel and Asgore - a small, shy looking child with a smile that you can’t quite place. 

The other child…

Oh god. You’ve seen that other child before.


	109. Wherein Undyne is Slightly and Understandably Confused

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [ There's a new chapter of Delete or Be Deleted!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6122618/chapters/16393453)
> 
>  
> 
> [Complain at me for that last chapter of DoBD!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> [Wrexie's stream is happening tonight!](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)
> 
>  
> 
> [Witness me as I beg for your scraps!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tipjar)

“My dear? Is everything alright?” Toriel’s watching you closely. You open your mouth to speak, then suddenly think better of it. Right. ‘Oh, Toriel, I have some terrible news, the kid you just showed me a picture of and are clearly still mourning came to me in a spooky dream and threatened me to stay out of their way?’ Just what every grieving mother wants to hear. Maybe you could tack a ‘fuck you’ and two raised middle fingers on the end there, just for effect!

“I’m sorry.” You apologize quickly. “I just… seeing their pictures?” It’s a weak explanation. Actually, it’s not an explanation. It’s just kind of some words. But Toriel seems to fill in the gap, since she says, very quietly, 

“Oh, my niece, we will all ensure that your babe comes to no harm.” Oh. Oh, shit, is that a normal thing to be worrying about? Is that what most pregnant ladies would be worried about? Shit, you’re not in that space mentally, you’re busy trying to deal with the fact that you had met one of these kids before, that they had been straight-up-goddamn _threatening_ , and that, in your limited observation, when someone threatened you it generally meant that they were going to get up to some “let’s kill ______ and maybe the whole world as well” bullshit. 

Okay. Okay. Play this cool. You close the locket slowly, passing it back to Toriel. She seems to think that you’re in a fit of emotional new-mother sensitivity - when you press it in her hand, she clasps both of yours, holding them tight. “Oh, my dear. I know this is terribly frightening, but things are different now. Humans will not harm your child. We will not permit it.” She says, a stubborn light in her eyes like you’ve never seen. 

“Is that… did humans hurt…” You try, nodding at the locket and allowing some of your concern and fear to leak into your voice. After all, you _are_ concerned. Just… you know. Concerned about a creepy ghost-kid. Toriel looks distant for a moment. 

“Asgore and I had only one son. A little boy. Asriel. The most darling prince, the perfect.... well. Well.” She clears her throat. “And then, one day, there was another. A curious thing about the barrier, it seems, is that it was apparently constructed… things slipped through, from the outside world. Garbage, mostly. Food scraps, bits and bobs. Confused animals, the beasts with quiet souls that do not speak… and. Children. Human children. Once in a great while, a child would fall through.” She says, her voice quiet and tense. “Chara, our child, was the first. So much like Frisk. So curious. So determined. They were inseparable, my children. They did everything together. And when Chara grew ill-”

“Hey! Nerd! It’s your turn!” Undyne roars, and startled, you look up. Everyone’s staring at you and Toriel across the little rope bridge.

“Oh. Dear. And here I am, going on about awful things from so long ago.” Toriel sighs. You shake your head, and try to find the right words, before Undyne yells again:

“Come ON, weirdo!”

“I’m COMING!” You yell back, and release Toriel’s hands, giving her an apologetic smile. Before you cross the bridge though, while you have this sliver of privacy, something occurs to you. “Tori… Asgore. Will he be okay, with…” Her mouth forms a hard line. 

“Let me manage him.” She says, and her tone indicates that there will be a world of hurt for her husband if he says one unkind word about your pregnancy or future child. 

Okay. So that’s that. It’s honestly a relief to know that Toriel’s on your team, even if… well, even if you want to throttle Undyne for interrupting just when Toriel was about to tell you something that sounded like it would be important. It’s okay, you tell yourself. You’ll talk to Toriel again. It’s not like she’s going anywhere, and since she apparently is assuming that motherhood comes with a mean case of the, uh, what’s that thing that ladies in old movies had that made them faint all the time? The vapors?

Well, regardless. Any more questions when you get her on her own next will probably seem natural to her. No reason to tip the whole “sorry about your ghost kid” hand. If… Chara? If Chara _was_ even a ghost. How do ghosts work, exactly? You glance at Mettaton as you head back over to putt, but he’s preoccupied with Capra, who’s trying to explain the physics of getting the golf ball over a stream obstacle to Frisk. Ugh, that was almost, nearly cute. 

Sans gives you another quick once over when you return to line up your shot - you don’t do great, exactly, but it’s near-ish to the hole. 

“everything cool?” He checks, cool bones brushing against your hand as you straighten up. You give him a quick smile. 

“Totally cool.” You assure him. Still, he gives you a slightly dubious look, and for the rest of the afternoon, he’s glued to your side, laughing, flirting, making jokes and heart-eyes and just very occasionally acting a little more protective than he might normally. Welp. Pestering Toriel for information would have to wait. Then again, maybe this is for the best. Toriel’s still watching you, but with such an affectionate look on her face, especially when she sees Sans interacting so gently with you. It’s enough to make you feel guilty that you’re still, uh, low-key scheming to find out more information about her dead kid. 

You can’t help but notice that Undyne’s watching you a little suspiciously as well. 

Still, mini-golf ends up being a success, even though it does take forever to get through all eighteen holes, even though your group of mostly monsters, a girl with a skeleton arm, a small child, and a thirty eight year old CEO who keeps talking about how happy he is that he can finally wear long pants again - well, you draw some attention, and not everyone seems exactly pleased to see that your party has invaded the local miniature golf place. You don’t care. You get burgers and ice cream at the snack shack once you’ve finished (Papyrus having won by a really staggering amount - Capra’s already trying to get him to play real golf with him at the next big EbbCo outing), and then you scurry across the road to eat your food on the beach and watch the sun set over the water. Sans cuddles up next to you and eats a burger AND half your ice-cream cone. He’s trying. It’s a perfect night, really. 

Except for, uh, the spooky dead kid thing. 

\-----------------------------------

By the time Thursday rolls around, you’re wishing that you could just go back in time and relive the nice evening on the beach a hundred times. Can you do that?? Oh, probably not. According to your soon-to-be father-in-law, that would end the universe or something. 

It’s not all that bad. It’s just that, well, work is stressful. Grant applications are due soon, and you’ve been locked away in your office doing tons of paperwork, only very occasionally getting to stick your head out to hang out with Undyne and Cody. You’d actually planned to have lunch with them today, thinking that this would be a good chance to relax, but it turns out you’d gotten your hopes up prematurely. When you roll into the small cafeteria to sit with them, they both have heavy expressions on their faces. 

“Uh oh. Guys. What’s up?” You ask. You haven’t known Cody for long, but the guy’s a fountain of enthusiasm - you’ve already gotten three commendations from visitors about how upbeat and friendly he is. And Undyne, well, it’s never a good sign to see Undyne so serious. She clears her throat. 

“Don’t freak out.” She cautions. “But, uh, you know the MIB?” 

“We’re not calling them that. But yes. The, uh, people who tried to kill us? I know them.” You say, settling into your seat and feeling your heart plummeting 

“About a hundred of them made bail today. Back in their homes, free to get back up to the same bullshit as before.” Undyne growls. You wince. 

“Shit.” You breathe, and Cody nods, looking grim. 

“Uh. Dude. Two of ‘em live next to my mom’s house. It’s… it sucks, dude. Like, my little sister, Asha? She’s uh, she made friends with all these kids from school, monsters too, obvi. Like, bro, it’s just my mom and her and some racists who are gonna be pissed because there’s monsters over all the time, but I, uh, I don’t want my sister to be scared, and-”

“Bro.” Undyne addresses him, and you try not to snort. Oh, that was new. “You just call me if they have any trouble. I’ll be there.” 

“We’ll be there. We’ve got your back.” You assure him. You’ll have to mention that to Sans, of course. Oh, god, if he started getting antsy about you helping people because of your, er, condition, you’d simply have to kill him. After all, it wasn’t like anything had even changed yet!

Or, uh. Almost anything.  
“‘s brighter.” He tells you immediately, once you’re home on Thursday night and you have a second alone. You glance down and grimace. 

“I know.” You sigh. Keeping this little green dot a secret was proving tougher than you thought. Already, you’re pretty sure that one or two monster patrons had done a double take, looking at you, and if that was the case, it was nothing short of a miracle that nobody had noticed in this house yet. “I think we might need to drop that bomb earlier than, um, anticipated.” You admit. A giddy expression crosses Sans’ face for a second, before he remembers that you, being a human, are still not delighted with the idea of announcing this any sooner than necessary. 

“yeah. sorry.” He says, trying to sound solemn. You eye him for a moment, then groan. 

“Aw, man, don’t make me feel bad! This is… it’s good. It’s good. You’re allowed to be happy about it.” You laugh, then take a breath. “Okay. So. Who do we tell first?”

“...probably-”

“Undyne-”

“papyrus-” 

You pause, and look at each other, then burst out laughing. “Oh god.” You sigh. “They’ll both be furious if they think they weren’t the first.” 

“they aren’t the first. that was gaster.” Sans reminds you, and you roll your eyes just really, _really_ dramatically at him. 

“Okay. First one who didn’t try to kill us?” 

“fair. except. toriel.” He reminds you. 

“Okay. First one who didn’t try to kill us or show me a locket with the spooky dead kid from my spooky-ass dream?” You drawl, and he snorts with laughter, nudging your shoulder with his. “Hey. How about I tell my best friend, you tell your brother. Technically they both get to be first?” You offer. He thinks about this, then nods quickly. 

“heh. can’t wait until i get to be smug about it in public.” He says, and you laugh. 

“Soon, babe.” You promise, and stand up. “Okay. I’m gonna tell Undyne while I still have the nerve.” You glance down at your stomach. There it is, that tiny green speck that’s growing brighter each day. 

“oh boy. i’d better, uh, take paps outside. if we’re telling people one at a time.” Sans thinks. You think about the times you’ve heard Papyrus at maximum volume, and grimace. Then you think about the times you’ve heard _Undyne_ at maximum volume. 

“Oh… man.” 

\---------------------------

“So. Nerd-o. Not that I don’t love that you’ve just randomly invited me out on this moonlight beach stroll… or, you know, that you took us to a different beach even though there’s a perfectly good one in the back yard? I mean, change in scenery is always good, right?” Undyne tries. “But.... hey. You got something you need to tell me?” 

Welp. That was easy. 

“Actually… yeah. Oh jeez. How do I start this?” You mutter, and she blinks her big yellow eye at you.

“You know we can move out no problem, right? We’ve got Alphys’ old place still, and it seems like you and Sans have been really goin’ for a lot of alone time recently, and I mean, you’re getting married-”

“...What?!” You stop in your tracks and look at her. She stares back, looking somewhat miserable. “Oh! Man. No! No way! We’re not kicking you out! I love having you guys here!” You laugh, somewhat hysterical. Undyne blinks at you, then lets out a booming, victorious laugh. 

“Oh, man, good, because we are saving so much money - andalsowelovelivingwithyou!” She adds quickly, worried that she’d offended you. You can’t help it. You cackle, clutching onto her arm until you get your breath again. 

“Oh god.” You finally gasp, and she snickers, looking down at you. 

“Then what’s up? What’s the big deal?” She demands. Slowly, you straighten up. 

“Okay. So. Um. When… uh, when a human and a skeleton … love each other…. very much?” You begin, and it’s her turn to burst out laughing. 

“Oh man. You had me going for a second there! You guys aren’t married yet!” She snickers. You clear your throat, and she stares at you. “You’re not, though.” She says. “So how can you-” She cuts herself off, her gaze moving from your eyes, to your soul/left boob region on down… 

“Well.” She finally breathes. “Holy shit. Ho-lee shit.” There’s a long moment of silence, then she meets your eyes again, her smile bigger than you’ve ever seen it. “IT’S GREEN!” She shrieks, letting out a peal of laughter. “Oh man! Sans is probably so jealous! That little bean in there takes after its Auntie Undyne!” She crows, then wrinkles her brow. “Oh, I don’t love how that sounds.” She observes, but then gets back on track. “You’re gonna be a mom! You’re gonna have a freaky-hybrid baby! I called it! I totally called it! So… oh, man, this is so exciting! Oh man… when are you gonna lay the egg, you think!?” 

It turns out that you and Undyne actually have a lot to go over. 

\---------------------

“hey bro. thanks for hangin’ out with me.” He feels nervous. Which is silly. It’s Papyrus! It’s not going to be a bad talk. Papyrus will be so excited! It’ll be fine, Papyrus is so smart and so understanding and so goddamn full of love, he doesn’t know what he’s worried about…

Oh god, he’s worried. 

“OF COURSE, SANS! I SHOULD APOLOGIZE, I’VE BEEN SO BUSY LATELY, I HAVEN’T BEEN ABLE TO MAKE AS MUCH TIME FOR YOU AS I WANT TO!” Papyrus says brightly, digging his toes in the sand. Just two skeletons, hanging out on a sand dune, one of them lying. It hasn’t been Paps who hasn’t made enough time, and he knows it. He’s got to do better. He just needs to focus, and he’ll… he’ll figure it out. 

“heh. yeah. me too, bud.” He says quietly. “but, uh. gotta be honest. this isn’t just a, uh, nighttime-brothers-trip-to-the-beach.” 

“I SUSPECTED THAT WASN’T A THING!” Papyrus says happily. “WELL? WHAT IS IT THEN? HAVE… OH, SANS, IS THIS A SURPRISE PARTY?” 

“uh, nope.” 

“GOOD! IT WOULD BE A TERRIBLE ONE!” Papyrus laughs, and Sans lets out a little chuckle, then looks seriously up at his brother. 

“k. so. me and ______. uh. i’m… i’m gonna be a dad. wasn’t somethin’ we planned, but it’s good. it’s good.” He says quietly. Papyrus holds perfectly still as he processes this, his eyes growing progressively more starry - he begins to make a very quiet “eeeeeee” noise, like a kettle about to squeal. Sans braces for the outburst. 

It doesn’t come. 

“Sans.” Oh god. Paps is using his indoor voice. This is so bad. This is the goddamn worst. He’s upset, he’s hurt, he’s- “You don’t need to worry.” Papyrus says softly. “You’re nothing like our father. You won’t be anything like him. You were the most wonderful brother for a… for me, growing up. You will be the most amazing dad.” He says quietly, and Sans feels something in his ribcage plummet, because Papyrus is right, because that’s where the source of worry was, the thing that was making him fear that his brother would be disappointed with him or upset. “DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?” A wide grin is crossing Papyrus’ face now, even bigger than usual. “YOU WILL BE THE MOST AMAZING DAD THE WORLD HAS EVER SEEN! WE’LL BEGIN TRAINING TONIGHT! BY THE TIME I’M DONE WITH YOU, THERE WON’T BE A THING YOU CAN’T PUT A DIAPER ON!”

Normal Papyrus is back, with a vengeance. Sans can’t help it. He grins at his brother, beginning to laugh. How did he deserve a brother this good?

“I’LL START LEARNING RECIPES FOR BABY SPAGHETTI!”

“not a thing, bro.”

“BABY RAVIOLI, THEN!”

“...ok.” He’d deal with that later. 

“WE’LL NEED TO FIND IT A VERY SMALL SUIT OF ARMOR!” 

“yup, yup, good point-”

“AND A FLAMETHROWER!”

Oh god. He should really be stopping this. “yup. baby flamethrower-”

“AND WE WILL NEED TO BUY YOU ALL THE NUMBER ONE DAD MUGS ON THIS PLANET! NOBODY WILL TAKE YOUR CLAIM! I WILL DEFEND YOUR HONOR, BROTHER!” Papyrus says vehemently, beaming at him. Sans grins back, feeling weak with relief. 

“i love you, bro.” 

“NO TIME FOR MAWKISH SENTIMENT! THE ENEMY DADS MAY STRIKE AT ANY MOMENT!” Papyrus insists, but after a moment, he grabs Sans in an enormous, bone-rattling hug. “I AM SO HAPPY FOR YOU, BROTHER. YOU AND ______ BOTH.” He says, in something that passes for a quiet Papyrus voice when he’s not doing that unsettling normal volume thing. 

“me too, paps.” He sighs, and then lets out a helpless, relieved, scared, delighted laugh. “me too.”


	110. Wherein Capra and Mettaton Hang Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sexual Content Warning
> 
> [u mad bro?](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

“She finished it.” Mettaton’s voice is low and silky in his ear, a whispered breath that is strictly for Capra. Which is kind of goddamn stupid. He figures it must be for effect, so he plays along. 

“Hm?” He doesn’t move, doesn’t react more than the slightest raised eyebrow, but he keeps his voice low all the same. Seems only fair, since Threep had gone to the effort to lean over the back of the recliner to hiss secrets at him, even if he was the only damn person in the family room. It’s Friday evening, Sans is probably up in his lab, you haven’t gotten home from work yet, and Alphys and Undyne are out on a date. This leaves him and Mettaton, an equation that was very slowly annoying him less and less. 

“I’m gonna need a little more to go on than that.” He adds, after a moment of waiting where the robot just hovers by his shoulder, looking smug. Mettaton lets out a low, rich laugh, the kind that invariably makes him sit up and pay attention, and he strolls slowly around to the front of the recliner, feet clicking on the hardwood as he moves to face Capra, looking at him with an expression of unbelievable satisfaction.

“Alphys. The project that I asked her to begin working on. You know. _The Project._ She finished it.” Mettaton murmurs, an eyebrow arching. Capra has to think about this for a second, and then, suddenly, he understands.

“Oh!” Oh, fuck, _yes_! Finally! He looks the robot over slowly, consideringly, his lips curling up into a smile in spite of himself. He lets his eyes rest for just a heartbeat longer on the panel of polished alloy that marks Mettaton’s… pelvis? Is that the right word? Doesn’t matter. It does look new, now that he thinks about it. His eyes dart upwards, meeting the robot’s gaze once more, and takes in, oh, the glorious lack of those pointy shoulder things. Threep’s been paying attention to his complaints! Normally, he would be effusive with his gratitude that the person he’s been sharing his bed with (even though, god, it is not strictly necessary to share a bed anymore) had been so considerate, but right now… his eyes keep wandering back down to the, uh, crotchal region.

Mettaton looks quite pleased indeed now, watching him. Pleased, and just a little nervous. “Well, have you taken it out for a test drive yet?” Capra drawls quietly, giving Mettaton a smile that either promises or threatens something, he isn’t quite sure which yet. Again, Mettaton lets out that soft, purring laugh.

“Goodness, no.” He breathes. “I’ve never had one of my very own before. I need someone to make sure I’m doing it properly.” He can’t help it, once he’s said that. He gives Capra such a wide, boyish, gleaming, up-to- _absolutely_ -no-good smile, and Capra’s up and out of the recliner before he even knows it. Still;

“We’re, uh, talking about cock, right? You finally got something good waiting for me on the other side of the, uh, the metal speedo, Threep?” He drawls, tracing a slow line down the robot’s chestplate with a finger as he teases him. Mettaton can’t resist it. He starts laughing, but again, it’s those low, rich laughs, the ones that rumble and echo in his chest, like the purr of a revving engine, of-

“You’re a fucking idiot.” He breathes fondly, and Capra can’t help it - god, he _loves_ it when he can wear Mettaton down enough to make the robot swear, and he rewards him for his bad language, leaning forward and kissing him roughly. Mettaton melts, going all loose and relaxed the second that Capra’s lips touch his - it’s not fucking fair, Capra thinks, not for the first time, that those metal lips don’t bruise or go weary, that Mettaton can’t be marked or made sore, or-

“Not here.” Mettaton murmurs, pulling away and just _looking_ at him for a moment, that familiar heated desire that Capra had quickly learned to recognize flickering in the robot’s pupils. Oh, god, and at _last_ he could do something about that. At fucking last! After all… Oh, man, this had been irritating him for so long. What kind of terrible person built a monster with sexual desires a body and left off the goddamn… fucking… **dick?!**

...Well. Someone who currently lacked any interest in dick, he supposed. He’d had half a mind to storm out and lay into Alphys about it the day he’d discovered the robot’s predicament. Poor Mettaton. And for fuck’s sake, the least Sans could do, in his capacity as scientist-with-a-dick, would surely be to have pity and correct for Alphys’ design defect, but then… well. Why would Sans have cause to know about Mettaton’s assets (or lack thereof)? And, ha, furthermore, he supposed that whatever weird kind of magic bone it was that Sans was packing that got you to moan the way you do, it was probably composed of nothing like what Mettaton required, so-

Oh, getting fucking distracted again, Peter. Now was not the time to be thinking about his best friend’s cock, or the way it makes his fiancee moan, or-

Oh, _come on, Capra!_

“Yeah? Wouldn’t want to desecrate the sanctity of the family room, I suppose.” Capra snickers, forcing himself to focus, and Mettaton laughs again, this time not the low, seductive laugh - it’s an undignified snort, and something in Capra’s chest feels, god, it’s almost like… what is that, is that pain? But it’s not pain and-

It’s fine. Don’t think about it. 

“Just because our dear hosts think that they’re being secretive in their endeavor to explore the romantic possibilities of every room in the house doesn’t mean that we-”

“Shh. Yeah. I know. Just messing with you. Bedroom.” Capra interjects, before Mettaton can launch into the type of prim, rule-abiding behavior that would just _ruin_ this, but thankfully, Mettaton merely grins at him, then grabs his hand, pulling him greedily down the hall, and the thought, once again, strikes him: _Finally_! After months of such a one-sided relat-

What? Peter, what the fuck was that you had just been thinking, because-

The thought becomes unimportant, or rather, other thoughts become much more important, the second the door to their - his - bedroom clicks shut behind them. The look on Mettaton’s face is suddenly harder, practically starving, and he murmurs;

“I need you to show me how-” Beneath that hardness and that hunger, there is something soft, something vulnerable and nervous and hopeful, and _fuck_! He’s so glad that he’s finally free of his casts, that he’s feeling like himself, his old self, more or less, and he can’t remember the last time he was made this eager (or hard!) just from a few shy words. 

“Mmm, don’t worry. We’re gonna make up for lost time.” Capra growls in the robot’s ear, kicking off his shoes - it seems that force fields will not presently be necessary - just as clever metal fingers begin work on his belt. “You really… mmph, you never,” (He pauses to collect himself as Mettaton runs his fingertips lightly over his straining erection through his boxer briefs, having pushed down his pants just enough - oh goddamn it, he was finally back in his good suits, that was going to wrinkle, but! oh. fuck. he doesn’t even care.) “even - fuck, Threep - ... before you were a robot, when you were a ghost-”

“Never.” Mettaton confirms quietly, glancing away for just a moment, something like shame or embarrassment on his face. Capra gathers that he’s said the wrong thing, and he speaks again, quickly;

“Fuck, I am so happy to be here for this.” He mutters, and he’s telling the truth, that’s the crazy thing. “I’m going to make you feel so fucking good…” He promises, leaning in for a kiss that is slightly less forceful - okay, fine, it’s kind of… sweet. It… it’s fine. Mettaton seems reassured by his words and the gesture, and he tugs off Capra’s suit jacket, then quickly unfastens his tie, unbuttons his shirt. More for the “wrinkled” pile. Capra doesn’t give a solitary fuck. Mettaton lets out a soft noise of satisfaction, taking Capra in with a long, hungry gaze, and then he leans in, pressing a kiss to the thick muscle between Capra’s shoulder and neck. Capra runs a hand through the robot’s hair, grunting softly when he feels Mettaton’s teeth scrape against his shoulder while his hand slides into his boxer briefs-

“Wait.” He remembers himself. “It’s your turn, Threep.” As he speaks, he guides Mettaton backward, guiding him to sit down on the bed, and Mettaton thinks about this for a second before he bursts into laughter. “What?” Capra demands instantly, and Mettaton looks seriously up at him, an eyebrow quirking. 

“Do you remember what you said the first time we did this?” He asks abruptly. Capra grimaces.

“Uh-” He begins, but it’s too late; from the speakers embedded in Mettaton’s chestplate, he hears a recording of his own voice from the first time they’d done this, god, the day he’d come home from the hospital. It isn’t exactly flattering. It is, in fact:

“Look. If you really wanted to help, I’ve got one suggestion. You could put that mouth to work doing something other than complaining. See, my right hand, pretty damn broken. It can’t perform its most important function. It’s been two long fucking weeks. I’d fuck literally anything in this room. See that potted plant? I’d fuck it. That pillow? I would make ______ weep with the things I’d do to that pillow. I’m desperate. And I know you’re not here just out of the goodness of your heart either. You think I’m hot, and you really are trying to help. But when you keep talking on and on, all I can think about is how much better we’d both feel If we just skipped all the dancing around and you just…. Oh. Oh fuck yes. I can’t believe that actually worked?… Fuck, mmmm, oh… oh sh-” Well, he remembered that distinctly - he was pretty sure that it had taken him less than two minutes (it had been weeks, and Mettaton could give a fucking spectacular blowjob!), and he was one hundred percent sure he hadn’t been exactly kind enough to warn his partner when he was about to finish...

“Okay. You’ve made your point.” Capra cuts the recording of himself off, laughing weakly, and Mettaton begins to laugh as well, though his eyes are still dark with desire, and something else, maybe. “Besides. You don’t know that I _didn’t_ fuck the ficus later. Out of spite.” He adds, and Mettaton rolls his eyes, though he still looks amused. 

“I just never dared to imagine that you would ever give someone priority in this arena.” Mettaton snickers, and Capra bares all his teeth in a hungry smile, saying, 

“Well, if you don’t show me how to do this, I might change my mind. How the fuck did Alphys - ohhhh. ” He murmurs playfully, watching Mettaton as the robot looks distant, concentrating, and… oh, of course it does, his goddamn crotch pulls some Transformers nonsense that he’ll need to ask to watch again later, but later though, because right now… “Well that is just sci-fi as… as… is balls the right term?”

Mettaton is sitting there, looking anxiously up at him (well, hiding his anxiety with a perfect, frosty smile) and a fucking, oh that is a gorgeous looking cock, all sleek and modern and chrome, of course, like Threepio had just selected the most expensive model in the pages of the IKEA Dicks catalogue. Was that a thing? He should make it a thing. IKEA might have an issue with it, but-

“W...well?” Mettaton prompts, after a long, silent moment. Capra forces his eyes back up to the robot’s face, and realizes that, no, Mettaton is not just anxious about this, he is fucking petrified. He needs to say something-

“You’re fucking… damn it, Threep, you’re... _beautiful._ ” He mutters, his voice sounding raspy to his own ears. Goddamn it, is that the right word? He doesn’t know. He was just saying what came to mind, but maybe that’s stupid… Mettaton’s still watching his face, but he must see what he wants to see, because he pushes up off the bed and kisses him once more, hard and desperate - the robot’s fingers are in his hair, clutching his back, a hand is gripping his ass; it’s like Mettaton suddenly needs all of him, all at once, and he needs to calm himself, to regain control of the situation. He wants Mettaton to know - 

“Sit back down.” He instructs, taking a step back. Mettaton blinks at him, and seems about ready to protest, so Capra quickly murmurs, “Gotta trust me, Threepio.” 

Mettaton clearly has to think quite hard about _that_ proposition, but eventually he sinks back down to a seat on the edge of the bed. Capra grins crookedly.

“How does it feel?” He asks, and Mettaton tilts his head slowly. 

“Er. Right now?” He asks pointedly, since, well, nobody is doing anything. Dickwise, anyway. Capra smirks and shrugs.

“Yeah.” He says, and Mettaton, to his credit, thinks about it. 

“I don’t… I’m not… It feels _right_ , I think. Like when… it’s… it’s good?” He breathes distractedly, and when he can’t come up with anything else, Capra cuts in. He can’t just stand there and wait much longer, anyway; he’s still so hard and he needs to show Mettaton-

“Can I touch you-”

“Fuck, please-” Mettaton practically whimpers, and there’s that swearing again - god, he _loves_ that shit, and, dropping to his knees, his newly healed right hand wrapping around that stupid, ostentatious, fucking gorgeous robot shaft, he knows that he is going to give Mettaton something that he’ll never, ever forget, and for some stupid-ass reason, he loves _that_ too. “Oh!” Mettaton gasps, his eyes defocusing with a mechanical whir.

“Yeah?” Capra smirks, his best “little shit” look in his eyes for a second, but then he really takes in Mettaton’s face, the rapturous expression, and right now… right now he doesn’t have it in him to fuck with the robot. He is _finally_ getting what he deserves, and… 

Capra strokes him, slow and controlled, and Mettaton slowly manages to tune back in, his fingers winding into Capra’s hair once more as he looks down, studying him, like this all might not be real, like Capra might still do something terrible, prank him, something, and for some reason Capra can’t have that, that can’t be what his - er, what Mettaton is thinking right now. He moves his head just a little, bites his bottom lip just enough to get the robot dwelling on thoughts of mouths, and then he waits, stroking skillfully and being patient because this is for _him_ , it’s gotta be perfect for the robot, he’s gotta figure out that he’s allowed to have everything he wants…

Mettaton stays quiet though, except for quiet little groans, and damn it, how does a person convince a robot that he can have it all, everything he’s been imagining? Suddenly, something occurs to him, and it seems so obvious that he can’t believe he hasn’t already done it - he doesn’t have to wait for Mettaton to discover he can ask for the use of his mouth; he can just be obnoxious enough that Mettaton will think of it… oh, yeah, that’s way funnier. He clears his throat, then grins up at the entranced robot.

“So.” He drawls, “How’d the conversation with Alphys go about this?”

“Peter.” Mettaton breathes disapprovingly, and now Capra’s just fucking aching at the way Mettaton says his name -

“No. Seriously.” He smirks. “What did you tell her? How’d you break the news that you’re a robot with needs, Threep?” His smile grows wider, his grip just a little looser - Mettaton’s losing that blissful expression, which he hates, but hey, necessary part of the process, right? “You tell her about me?” His eyes flash just a little. “Tell her that after all those show-biz dicks, you finally found someone you wanted enough to-”

“Peter. Please. You… ah, ‘you could put that mouth to work doing something other than-’... OH. Oh.” Finally. Mettaton gets it, but his sarcasm drops away, useless, the second Capra obliges. 

And, hey. He can give a mean blowjob too. He can give Threep a run for his money. Granted, he’s never had opportunity to practice on a goddamn metal - but you know what? Mettaton is enjoying it, and that’s what matters right now. Like… holy hell, is Mettaton enjoying it! He’s staring down at Capra with singleminded focus, and he’s almost whimpering and he doesn’t know where to put his hands and every minute that creeps by, Mettaton grows more unravelled -

“Peter…”

Well, that’s as much warning as he gets. Which normally would piss him right the fuck off, but the way Threep had just said his name - oh fuck. Oh fucking hell. He should be focusing on this ridiculous, electric, ecstatic feeling of magic, but all he can think about is how fucking beautiful that name had sounded on Mettaton’s lips, and it _hurts_...

You’re getting weak, Peter. 

He pulls away, gets to his feet, feeling a little lost, but Mettaton doesn’t notice. He just stands up and kisses him, and there are all sorts of emotions happening, oh christ, and this - this is where he leaves, right? Because this is bad?

He doesn’t leave. He lets a very enthusiastic Mettaton bear him back down to the bed and return the favor. His heart is thudding loudly in his ears, and there’s this feeling that’s probably dread… but, fuck, what if it’s not dread? Because if it’s not dread, it’s…

He looks down, he meets Mettaton’s eyes, and… oh, what the everloving - he did not recall telling his hand to slowly, _tenderly_ run his fingers through the robot’s hair! 

And yet. 

He thinks of the way Mettaton had whispered his name, like it was the only thing on earth that had ever mattered, and he manages a quick, “Threep-” before he finishes. 

Mettaton stretches out next to him on the bed - not touching him, the way that he’d repeatedly expressed to the robot that he liked. He’s got a profoundly smug, ridiculously pleased look on his face. He should go. He could go. Mettaton wouldn’t say anything. He wouldn’t be surprised. He could just go. He could leave, and none of this would have happened in any practical way. He could. 

Or. 

Very tentatively. Ridiculously tentatively, he reaches his hand over. Just a few inches. He covers Mettaton’s hand with his own, not meeting eyes, staring up at the ceiling, trying not to berate himself. He could just _have_ this. Everyone else had this. 

Mettaton lets out a quiet, surprised noise, a nearly silent intake of breath, but then he falls still. Capra doesn’t dare look over at him. This feeling isn’t dread, oh christ. It is not dread. 

“You don’t have to do this.” Mettaton finally pronounces, very slowly, very clearly. “Look. I know what this is. You’ve made it very clear, darling. And I… I don’t mind. You want magic. It’s fine. Let’s just… let’s not pretend, alright? I don’t think I could stand that. The pretending.” He says.

Oh. _Fuck._

“Ha.” He sits up at once, stands up, heads for the dresser, his hands feeling shaky. “Caught me, Threep.” Shirt. Pants. Now. Come on. “Okay, so I’m gonna go, uh, help Paps with dinner, so, I will catch you around, buddy.” Oh god. Why does his voice have to sound like that? He clears his throat, and Mettaton sits up.

“Oh. Oh my. No. Peter-” He begins, but Capra’s lip has already curled into a sneer. 

“No. You’re right. Let’s not pretend.” He says quickly, yanking a t-shirt over his head. Dressed enough. “Later, Threep.” 

It’s not that he’s running. It’s not. He’s not. This is _nothing._

Dinner, tonight, is looking like scotch.


	111. Wherein You Have A Talk On The Beach

Friday night is the shit-end of an absolutely spectacularly shitty day. Fine, not “father-in-law planning to kill you” levels of shitty, but “racist assholes holding a press conference two blocks from the aquarium” shitty levels for sure. Undyne’s spent the day just apoplectic:

“They get out of jail and they throw a whole production on about how they didn’t mean it and they’re _sorry?!_ ” She spat, over lunch. You sighed. 

“Guess that’s the way it’s gonna be. Cody, bud, is everything okay at home so far?” The intern jumped slightly, then held up a hand, wavering it in the air and looking quite unhappy. 

“They, uh, moved back in. The MIB.”

“Oh my god, we’re really not calling them that.”

“Oh, uh, sorry, boss. But, you know. The uh, anti-monster folks. So far nothing. Like, their lights were out at nine.” He said. “But Asha, she’s a little maniac, she’s totally gone nuts, dude. She’s like, making ninja stars out of tin foil and drawing plans for booby traps if they try to bother her friends.” 

“Oh man, we know a skeleton she’d _really_ get along with.” You’d muttered, glancing at Undyne. She’d laughed. 

“You kidding? She sounds rad. I wanna hang out with her, forget Papyrus!” She’d said. Cody’d stared at her with indisguised admiration, and you’d had to grin. 

“She does sound cool. Seriously though, bud, you find any trouble, you give us a call, okay? We know how to deal with a few assholes.” Undyne had smiled at you for that, but then suddenly, she’d glanced down. 

“Um. ______. You can’t just go getting in fights anymore. Not with, you know…” She’d trailed off, seeing the profoundly irritated look in your eyes. 

“Bruh, why can’t she fight? You said she’s badass! You said she can throw spears like you!” Cody protested, oblivious. 

“Undyne’s just being ridiculous.” You’d growled. “Right, Undyne?” 

“Heh. Right.” Undyne flushed, glancing away, and then began urgent small talk about the state of one of the trigger fish in the tropical reef tank that was apparently feeling unfulfilled. 

Still. That had worn on you all day. Like you couldn’t protect your friends, just because of the green dot in there! Oh, god, you hoped that nobody expected you to just put your feet up and let things happen to you now. You’d only _just_ gotten to the point where the monsters trusted you in a fight in the first place!

And then, well, a seal was sick and you’d needed to stay until the emergency vets cleared her - just a little bug, it seemed, but that was still an extra three hours after everyone else had left. You’d told Sans to find something to entertain himself with forever ago, since date night was clearly not happening, and dinner had been cookies and chips from the vending machine, which was probably another one of those “bad things for a pregnant lady to do,” right? Well, the first person to lecture you was going to get slapped real good, skarm style. You were irritated and tired and there were _still_ protesters proclaiming their innocence when you left the building, and worse, you had to walk past those assholes. 

You’d been stubborn this morning and driven the Deathtrap into work, rather than just making a shortcut. Sans hadn’t liked that, of course, and you’d had to calm yourself by remembering that Sans didn’t like you driving it in the first place, even before Green Dot had showed up on the scene. And, well, shit, now it turned out he’d been right, because the garage you parked in was by the park full of protestors. Spectacular. 

It doesn’t occur to you until you’re halfway past them that you could have just made a shortcut to the car. No. That would have made sense. Instead, you have to walk past twenty-five odd humans, all of whom fall eerily silent the moment you’re recognized. You don’t look, don’t acknowledge them. You definitely don’t stubbornly think about the fact that these people had tried to kill you. That each and every one of them had wanted you dead enough to point their guns at you, that the only way you’d avoided that death was by stopping time itself, somehow.

That you’d rescued them, and now they were here, silent, staring. 

You’re shaking by the time you get in your car, and for once, you pull a Sans trick - you just trace a doorway carefully in front of the car, and a moment later it’s home safe in the driveway, and so are you, shuddery and mad and just… furious that those people were already out and about, like they hadn’t been ready to end your life, and Sans’, and Undyne’s. Oh, god. Sans would be so upset if he saw you so worked up. You’d…

You’d just take a little walk first, get some air. When you were dealing with losing your parents, with Paula, you’d done that all the time. You’d spent more time in the backyard than inside, really, sitting on the beach, just… thinking. As you stroll down to the water, your nerves subsiding a bit, you decide you should do this more. Get out of your head. Make sure that you don’t snap at Sans for things that weren’t his fault-

“Hey.” You jump half out of your skin before you recognize Capra’s voice.

“Ah! Jeez, where are you?” You complain. 

“Beach.” His voice announces. You glare at the retaining wall that must be hiding him, then hop it. He’s propped up against the other side, sitting on the sand, looking out at the water, and there’s a bottle of scotch next to him that has an appreciable dent in it already. He looks up at you, sees you judging the scene, and gives a spectacularly careless shrug. 

“...Rough day?” You gather, and sit down next to him, since you can’t really think of a not-rude way to just walk away. 

“You’d better fucking believe it.” He says. “You?”

“Basically the worst.” You agree. “Walked past a protest from the folks who tried to kill us. Seal barfed on my khakis, too.” 

“Ah. Sorry.” He says, and takes a pull from the bottle. “Oh. Where are my manners. Want some of your dad’s scotch I stole?” He says, very dryly. God, that actually sounds spectacular right now. 

“Sure, hook me up.” You say, reaching out. He passes the bottle over with a shrug, and you’re just about to take a really, totally ladylike swig when something dawns on you. “Oh. Shit. Wait. No.” You say, very quickly passing the bottle back. 

He stares at you like he’s never seen the likes of you before. 

“...Now what the fuck was that?” He finally pronounces, low and suspicious and more than a little worried. “You okay?” His eyes narrow suddenly. “Don’t care if he is my best friend, man, if Sans is sayin’ that you’re not allowed to hang out with your pal Peter and drink scotch, ‘s messed up.” You watch him, and see that he is both clearly, at the very least tipsy, and genuinely concerned. Oh god. 

“Of course not, Capra. I just… can’t.” You sigh, leaning your head back against the retaining wall and staring out across the bay at Mt. Ebott. He’s still looking at you. 

“Gonna need a little more to go on than that.” He says dryly. You grimace, and then turn and look at him. 

“Why do women my age suddenly stop drinking, Cap?” You ask gently. His brow furrows, then understanding dawns on his face. He inhales sharply, then stares up at the sky. 

“And the hits just keep coming tonight, folks!” He says, letting out a slightly hysterical laugh. “Oh christ. You okay? I mean it. You gonna be okay?” 

“...Yeah. Yeah, Cap. It’s not a bad thing.” You tell him gently, and he laughs again. 

“Right. Of course it isn’t. You love that beautiful son of a bitch. Can’t blame you. He’s great. You’re great. Your kid will probably be great. Congratulations?” He can’t manage to not make the word into a question, all the same. You laugh quietly and nod.

“I’ll take ‘em.” You say, and he snickers, staring down into the bottle again. 

“Just as well.” He says after a moment. “I realized tonight, you know, it’s uh, time for me to be getting back home. It’s been… real. But, you know. Limbs better, ribs better, all patched up and you’ve got a baby… _thing_ on the way. It’s uh… time to go back to normal.” He says, and takes another draw from the bottle. You think about this.

“You know…” You start out, not entirely sure you want to say this. Still, Mettaton’s been a friend to you. He deserves you making the effort. “Um. Not everyone wants you to leave. I think your robot friend would be pretty happy if you stuck around.” 

The look Capra gives you is enough to make you flinch. 

“He can go… fuck himself.” He decides, pronouncing it slowly. “I don’t think you’re right on that one, bud, but I… I do not give a single shit what he wants. It’s not like we’re _dating._ ” He spits, the word sounding toxic when coming from his mouth. “We’re not a thing. So he can just… I don’t give a fuck, actually. I don’t care what he does.” You blink at him. You can’t help it, you hear yourself saying it before you can really measure its wisdom;

“Dude, I think you’re protesting too much.” 

His eyebrows raise slowly. 

“I assure you I am not.” He says, each word crisp and distinct. “I just… I don’t fucking get it, you know? I don’t understand. Why do you people do this to yourselves? Why do you just tie down to one person and then you… yeah, okay, whatever, they make you happy, but then when something goes wrong and they change their mind or you change yours and it’s just shitty and awful and it feels so much worse than anything you could have possibly gotten out of it in the first place, you know?” You stare at him, slowly piecing together that something must have gone terribly wrong between him and Mettaton to leave him in this state, and you wince. 

“It doesn’t have to be like that-” You start slowly, but he sighs and cuts you off. 

“Yes. It does. I know it’s not what you want to hear with, with fuckin’ baby Yorick in there, but that’s how it goes. People change. The person you think you care about becomes someone else. It’s goddamn stupid to lock down. It really is. Like. Holy shit. Why not just be with the person who makes you happy at the _moment?_ Like, why do we have to gamble that neither of you will do something to fuck it all up? No. No. Listen.” He insists, perhaps sensing that you’re about to wander away from this display of unhappiness. “Look. Just… just be honest. Can you do that?” 

You sigh. “Yes.” You confirm. 

“Okay. Okay. So. I’m an attractive guy, right?” He pauses, looking at you. Is he really making you do this?

“Yeah, Cap. Super hot.” You groan. 

“And yet, here you are. Sitting next to a guy that you think is super hot, but you’re doing this marriage shit. You’re locking down on one dude forever.” 

“Um, yes. That is the entire point.” You sigh. 

“It’s ridiculous. Stupid. You’re sacrificing everything because you’re just _hoping_ that you’ll be that one couple that works out, that loves each other through everything, and they just don’t exist. If you weren’t afraid of what people would say, if people would judge you, like, you could avoid taking that risk, you know? If you found yourself sitting next to a hot guy on a romantic-fuckin’-beach on a starry goddamn night, you’d just kiss him if you weren’t so worried about all those goddamn… conventions. Well, I’m not. And I mean honestly? Just kiss me now, get it over with, because sooner or later one or the other of you is gonna fuck it all up-” He abruptly interrupts himself and snaps at you, “WOAH. What the fuck!? Stop! What are you doing!?” 

You blink slowly, your head feeling foggy and disoriented. You are _much_ too close to Capra - he inches away from you, the alarmed look on his face turning to concern, and maybe something else.

“...You told me to kiss you.” You say quietly, your thoughts still murky and confused. 

Capra stares at you, his expression slowly growing more and more upset. Then, after a long, long pause, a look of terrible comprehension crosses his face. 

“Oh. Oh. Fuck. Oh god. No. Not this.” He mutters, and he locks eyes with you with an expression like you’ve never seen before. “Oh god. I’m so sorry.”

Something’s happening, and you just can’t comprehend exactly what it is. Everything feels muddy and strange, and he’s got this injured, terrified, sick look on his face. “Capra, what-”

“Stand up.” He says quietly. 

You stand up. He lets out a bitter, disbelieving laugh. 

“Of course. Of-fucking-course. Hey. Bud. Hop on one foot.” He snaps.

“For how long, jeez?” You ask him, beginning to hop. 

“Stop.” He says, and you comply. 

“I don’t understand what’s happening.” You say quietly, a tendril of fear beginning to twist into your brain. 

“Oh god.” He mutters. “Oh christ. Fuck. Fucking hell.” He stands up slowly, and looks down at you. He’s never made you feel so… small before. “We spent so much time trying to figure out what magic I could do. Oh. Fuck. He said it. That prick said it. He told me that my magic was probably different. That I might be using it this whole time. I was. Oh fuck. Fuck. I was.”

“Cap… what do you mean? What can you do?” You whisper. He locks eyes with you once again, and a bitter, sardonic smile splits his features. 

“Figure it out.” He commands.

You figure it out. 

After all. 

You _have_ to.


	112. Wherein Two Self-Inserts Just Talk Or Whatever, You Can Probably Just Skim This One And Wait For A Skeleton Dick Chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [u still mad bro?](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art (this time feat. dicks!)](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ Stream with us tonight](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington) with a special guest visitor of my brother, a man who has no idea that what I'm writing is about skeleton dicks, at approximately 11 pm est! And of course, fun fun fun before and after that!

“This is fucked up. This is so fucked up. Oh god.” Capra’s shaking now, and you’re just staring at him, trying to find the words that might, somehow, make this better. 

“Come inside, Cap.” You finally mutter. “We’ll figure it out.” He lets out a strangled laugh, and runs his hand shakily through his hair. 

“Figure it out.” He repeats skeptically, then winces. “Oh! Fuck. That wasn’t a-”

“Yeah. I know. I don’t think it works like that.” You mutter. He takes a breath, and just stares at you for a second. He might be crying. 

“Fuck.” He whispers again, and then he swallows, drops the scotch bottle on the ground, and nods. “Okay. Fuck. Okay.” 

You have to admit, as you trudge inside with him, that you’re wracking your brains, trying to figure out if Capra had ever… nudged you into doing things that you wouldn’t normally. Now that you’re thinking about it… oh, god, it seems so obvious. He’d told you to throw those spears at him and you’d just tried, like it was nothing, like there wasn’t the potential to kill your friend… There had to be more, right? Other times? You couldn’t remember. Oh god, poor Capra. You think, vaguely, that you should probably feel violated, but compared to the horror of the man next to you, you’re just… sad. Worried. Scared. 

He hesitates outside the sliding glass door to the kitchen, and glancing inside, you see why: Mettaton’s waiting there, at the kitchen table, looking down into a glass of wine that you suspect, just this once, is not a prop. Capra stands, frozen, staring in, then steels himself, gritting his teeth, and pushes the door open. 

Mettaton glances up at once, his mouth open, ready to say something. Then he takes in Capra, and changes his mind; you can see it on his face. 

“Oh… Peter.” He begins, and Capra lets out a hoarse, not entirely controlled laugh. 

“Threep, don’t.” He begins, then suddenly looks at you in horror. “No! I mean… fuck, do whatever you want!” He runs his hand through his hair again, and immediately heads to the kitchen sink, grabbing a glass and filling it up, his back to the both of you. Mettaton stares at you, practically willing you to explain what’s going on. It’s not for you to say, though, and you’re just… just trying to figure out how to even begin this, when you hear the familiar sound of Sans’ bare feet on the hardwood.

“hey! thought i heard you come in…” His enthusiasm wanes slowly as he takes in the scene. “oh. shit. what am i missin’?” He glances at Mettaton, who shrugs helplessly, then back at you. You clear your throat. 

“We should all, uh… we should talk about something.” You suggest, and Capra settles his water glass down on the counter with a decisive clink. 

“Yeah.” He says, the tone of a man condemned. Sans, if anything, looks more puzzled, then he sighs. 

“cap, you’re not uh, sulkin’ because we’re gonna have a kid, right? like, promise, you don’t have to do diapers or anything-” He stops, because Capra is letting out another hysterical laugh. He spins around, and shakes his head. 

“Nah. Good… good job, bud. I’m glad. You’re happy.”

“You’re going to have a child?” Mettaton breathes, looking between Sans and you. “Oh! My. How wonderful! How long-”

“Probably not the time.” You tell Mettaton quietly. Capra swallows, picks up his glass of water, then walks, miserable, over to the kitchen table. He collapses in the seat next to Mettaton, and braces an elbow on the table, holding his head up with his hand, his eyes shut. Sans looks skeptically at you, and you nod at the table. He shrugs, and sits down; you take the remaining seat. Mettaton’s watching Capra closely, his eyes glowing dimly with clear concern on his face. When Capra doesn’t move or speak, Mettaton very slowly reaches out and rests a hand on Capra’s upper back. Capra twitches, and for a second, you think he’s about to throw the gesture off, but then he relaxes again. Somehow this worries you even more. It seems to worry Mettaton too. He inches just a bit closer, and for the first time, you process just how much Mettaton’s grown to care for Capra. Oh… shit. 

Finally, Capra clears his throat, and looks up, his eyes rimmed with red, but looking more focused. 

“Look.” He says quietly. “Let me… tell you guys something.”  
\------------------------------------------------------

He is twenty-five, and he is a mess. 

Well, not a mess. Just a ball of anxiety and twitchy nerves and esoteric interests and the absolute inability to say the right thing at the right time, and… yeah. Yeah. A mess. 

But. Hell. He’s a mess with a lab coat, and the most brilliant damn mind this bumfuck tourist town had ever seen - except, well, for two people that were probably entertaining their kid with the telescope or shadow puppets or any of the educational-ass things that he let you get out of when he was babysitting. Er. Well, no. It was way too late for that. So, those brilliant minds were probably fast asleep, and, barring them, he just _had_ to be the smartest guy in Mt. Ebott Township. Hell, probably in the state! If he’d been here when the company was formed, he sure as hell wouldn’t have let it get named EbbCo. After all. Ebott. One ‘B’, bitches.

You’re getting distracted, Peter. 

“This is so stupid.” He tells himself quietly. Nobody’s here to hear him, of course, thank god. The last thing he needs is the reputation of a guy who talks to himself. It’s just as well that he’s decided to do this dumbass, idiot thing at three AM, where nobody can observe any of this ridiculousness. 

“You shouldn’t be doing this.” He tries again, as he walks around a curve on the path leading to the summit of Mt. Ebott and the barrier flares into view, all beautiful, pulsing golds and shimmering oranges and somewhere deep in there, white so bright you couldn’t stand to look at it without sunglasses.

He’d brought sunglasses. 

He slips them on, and he enters the cave mouth, using his EbbCo ID to get past the security fencing blocking it - and the massive, spinning turbines - off from the general public. It’s too dangerous for them to be here, after all. They could do something stupid and then sue. Something… well, like this. 

“Fuck, I’m dumb.” He mutters, staring up at the shimmering wall of the barrier, taking in the lights, the slight curvature - he knew it made a dome, they’d researched, they’d found that this exposed portion was just the very upward limit, that the barrier went for miles in every direction under Ebott, further than anyone was willing to pay to excavate. A force that was simply too much for human beings to even understand. Something fully and absolutely untouchable. 

And he was gonna touch it. 

It was all because Andrews, that absolute fucking dick, had just been insisting that the force exerted by the barrier was some sort of electricity. Which didn’t make any goddamn sense! Not even the tiniest bit! If there was one fucking thing electricity didn’t do, it was “make an enormous and inexplicable dome under a mountain.” 

“Well. It’s not magic, asshole.” Andrews had insisted. “I thought you were smarter than that woo-woo bullshit. Bossman and lovely wife might believe that nonsense, but I thought you knew better.”

Well, something like that just couldn’t stand. 

Most people hated getting close to the barrier. It felt wrong, they said, like it was shaking their bones, like it was going to tear them apart with each step closer. Not him, though. The barrier had never once bothered him. No, the word was probably closer to ‘entranced.’ It felt… warm. Familiar. Comforting. It was real. 

It was magic.

Even so. There was one goddamn rule that his friends, his bosses, that they’d made spectacularly clear. Don’t go messing around with the barrier, Peter, you glorious idiot. You’re too smart to get bug-zapped by a wall of magic strong enough to power the entire goddamn town. 

He bares his teeth in a grin, and, feeling every one of the six beers he’s had this night, he steps forward, arm outstretched. He could stop now. He could stop and turn around and nobody would fucking know about this. It could have been a fit of fancy, like when you’re driving down the highway and that thought pops into your head - what if, what if I just turned the wheel - 

He takes another step, and he can _feel_ it, all through him, but it’s not tearing him apart, no, it’s not that at all. It’s calling him closer. 

“Shit.” He tells nobody, and then he shrugs, and before he can stop himself he reaches out - in -  
It rushes through him like a wave, and it feels so fucking spectacular, it feels like victory, it feels like every test he’s ever aced, every perfect comeback he’s ever snapped at his dad, it feels like his first kiss, like winning his track meet, like…

He realizes, at that moment, that if he chose, he could go deeper. He could take that next step, and he’d be in the barrier. There’s something on the other side, there, and he could be the one to go through. He could be that guy. There’s been rumors, stories, legends about people who have fallen through, and they can’t all be lies, right, not if he’s not getting torn apart? He could know. 

Or.

He steps back suddenly, suddering, overwhelmed, as it feels like a world of information opens up to him all at once, as realization upon realization comes crashing down. He could say the right things. He could be the guy. Oh, fuck. He could be the guy, if there was one thing he ever understood in this moment it was how to be the person who said the right things, who did the right things, who would tear down the barrier and be admired and loved and adored by everyone. He could do it, because he had the most goddamn perfect brain in the entire world, and at last, fuck, at last! It was awake! Upgraded! Firing faster than he could possibly imagine!

He had a hundred and ten thousand dollars in his bank account. Tomorrow, he was going to take the day off. He was going to buy a really, really nice suit. A car that would impress. A better goddamn apartment, that was for sure. He was going to go to the bar and talk to a hot lady and get laid. People were going to look at him, and they were going to see the type of person that people just gravitated towards. The person who could do anything. 

People were going to love him. 

He was going to be the guy to save the world. 

\------------------------------------------------

The three of you stare at him as he laughs humorlessly, finishing his story. Only you understand the full extent, though. Only you can see the whole picture, and he knows it, because it’s your eyes he meets when he’s done. And you remember, just vaguely, your parents wondering what the hell had gotten into Peter, why he was acting like such a - oh, sweetie, are you listening to this, go watch Wishbone, okay, mom and dad are talking…

“Peter. I’m… so sorry-” You begin, but he shakes his head. 

“It’s been… thirteen years.” He mutters. “Guess… fuck. Fuck.” 

“i don’t understand.” Sans says quietly, though he looks worried and more than a little cautious.  
“This whole damn time. This whole time people have been doing what I want them to do.” Capra rasps, looking first at Sans, then, very seriously, at Mettaton. “What I tell them to do. It’s not because I’m a great guy. It isn’t. It isn’t. It never was. They just never had the option. I used to… until the barrier fell, that was my pilgrimage. Once a month or so, just to touch it. I didn’t realize. Fuck.” He looks up at you. “What do I do now?!” He asks, and Mettaton, looking lost in thought, slowly strokes Capra’s back. 

“uh. so. when you say people do what they tell you.” Sans begins, a glint in his eyes that you’re not sure that you like. “what did you do, capra? what have you done to us-”

“Sans.” Mettaton growls, before you can say a thing. “Don’t.” 

“ok, but… i mean. just, you know, lookin’ at this… it’s a little weird, right? that he’s our friend?” Sans says quietly, and this time, it’s you who glares at him. But Capra’s already nodding. 

“It’s… yeah. You’re not wrong, bud. Why would people like you be friends with-”

“Stop.” Mettaton demands again, and this time, Capra does shake his comforting hand off. 

“Threep. Don’t. You and I… god. God only knows what I’ve done to you. Please. Don’t. You must think I’m a monster. In, uh, the colloquial sense. If you don’t… well. You should.”

“No.” Mettaton growls suddenly, and part of you processes that - that Capra had said ‘don’t’ and yet, here was Mettaton, charging right ahead. Which meant that things were surely more complicated than - “Look. You… asshole. You’re not the only one with a good memory. Mine goes way back. All the way. Peter, I can replay everything you’ve said to me in crystal clear detail. Everything you’ve said to anyone when I’ve been there. So, no, I won’t permit you to do this. Because as much as you’d love to believe otherwise, I’m sure, you’re _not a bad person._ ” He breathes. 

“Do you know what you do? You don’t order. You don’t make anyone do… goodness, just about anything. You ask. You ask… well. Not always nicely.” He has a wry look on his face, and Capra clearly understands what he’s referring to, because he lets out a soft groan of shame that Mettaton ignores. “But you do. You care about people. You care more than just about anyone. You might be emotionally…. er, it may not be your strongest suit. But you do, Peter. You care, and that means that you put others first, over and over again. You’re not bad. You’re not wrong.” He lets out a quiet laugh. “You’ve gone thirteen damn years without noticing that you can even do this! Is that what a bad person would do?” 

Capra is silent. 

Mettaton looks up at you and Sans, and something is deadly and serious in his eyes. You don’t dare speak. “Peter.” Mettaton tries again. “Come to bed. I’ll show you as much as you need to hear. You can sleep this off. We’ll start fresh in the morning. Figure out what to do. It’ll be okay.” He says gently, and suddenly you feel very much that you shouldn’t be a spectator in this. Sans seems to think so too; he shifts uncomfortably on the wooden chair, but then he looks at you and his expression grows hard and protective again - though it’s not without sympathy. Sans just…

Well, Sans of all people would hate the idea that any part of his life was outside of his control. 

Capra’s looking at Mettaton, and for a second, something cruel crosses his face and you brace yourself for the backlash, for words of hatred and disgust and self-pity, but somehow… they don’t come. The look fades, and something more vulnerable takes its place. 

“...Okay.” He finally mutters. Seeing him so docile is just… creepy, but Mettaton looks relieved. He stands up, and nods at Capra. Capra’s about to get to his feet too, but before he does, he hesitates, and looks between you and Sans, then at Mettaton. 

“I swear to… fuck, everything. Everything that means anything on this planet. I’ll never use that shit again. It’s over.” He rasps, and then he stands up, allows Mettaton to wrap an arm around him, and he walks slowly from the room. 

Now you and Sans are alone. He grits his teeth for a second, then reaches for you, taking your hand. 

“you’re gonna be mad at me.” He begins, and you bite your lip before shaking your head ‘no.’

“...I know.” You sigh. He doesn’t need to say it. You’re both thinking it. 

Don’t trust him.


	113. Wherein There's Some Pillow Talk and Some Pillow Not-Talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [be my pal](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art (goddamn it wrexie and I are dragging each other into Capraton hell)](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

It’s pitch black. It’s three in the goddamn morning, and he should be asleep. He got by on less sleep than most people, but… fuck. He had shit to do tomorrow - today - he needed to… 

Mettaton’s next to him. Lights out, seems like nobody’s home. He knows that ‘sleeping’ isn’t really a thing that the guy did, but he suspects that Mettaton’s miles away, elsewhere, sorting through piles of data, trying to find the file that’ll prove to him that he, secretly, deep down, isn’t a total dick. Either that, or he’s dreaming of electric sheep or some bullshit. He’s trying, though. Capra knows that. The robot’s trying to make things better, and, fuck, did he not deserve that. 

Stop wallowing, Peter. 

He swallows, staring through the darkness at the other man, his head pounding, trying to remember what Mettaton had showed him. This, right here, this guy lying next to him, he’d done it of his own volition. He’d decided to have Capra’s back, even though he didn’t have to. Maybe that was something. Maybe that was enough for now. He takes a breath. 

“Threep?” He says quietly. A whirring noise, almost silent, something flickering back on. 

“Yes?” Mettaton is very quiet. He sounds nervous, maybe. Or is that something worse? Fuck. Is… is Mettaton scared of him now? Has he been running those processes, figuring out what Capra could do to him? Oh god. His throat feels like it’s closing up, like he can’t say a thing. He doesn’t want to say a thing. 

He just reaches out. Again. Christ, what an asshole he was. This was the second time he’d done this shit today, and he had absolutely no reason to believe that it would go any better than the first. He doesn’t know even why he’s doing it, except that, god, he can’t just keep lying there in the dark next to this still, silent body, wondering if Mettaton had figured out enough to hate him yet. There was a time where he would have been perfectly content with Mettaton hating him, and now… He reaches out, touches the robot’s chestplate, lets his hand rest there. There’s a soul under there somewhere that’s not mechanical, that’s not gears and pistons and RAM and electricity, something that’s fallible just like he is, that makes those human errors even though he’s so far from being human…

Mettaton doesn’t say anything either, but his own hand moves up, after a moment, and cool metal, slick plastic covers Capra’s hand. It doesn’t fall artificially still, like Capra had expected. Neither of them speak, but softly, with great curiosity, Mettaton’s fingers move, tracing the tendons on the back of his hand, his veins, all the fine adaptations that mark him as human, as unique. It’s easily the most intimate thing that he’s ever permitted any partner to do, as far as Capra’s concerned. Which is a hell of a thing to think when you’ve had the guy’s dick in your mouth, but… god, this isn’t sex. This isn’t friendship. This a third thing and he doesn’t know if he’s ready for it. He’d sort of gone through his whole life figuring that this was a thing he wouldn’t do. And now… It’s okay. It’s okay. He can do this. He can’t ruin another thing. Right now… right now, this is fine. 

He’s scared shitless.

He closes his eyes, and he wills himself to sleep.   
\---------------------------------------

You also struggle with some difficulty sleeping. After all, this is kind of a big thing to wrap your head around. 

“He’s our friend.” You remind Sans, around midnight. Sans nods, curling closer to you in bed, his hand absently stroking your back. 

“yeah. and i can’t remember him sayin’ anything to me that would make that happen. but. uh. i’m pretty sure all he’d have to do is say ‘forget me saying that stuff’ and…” He grits his teeth, and you sigh. 

“Sans. You saw him tonight. He’s not playing a game. Hell, you should have seen him when he figured it out-”

“yeah, well, he shouldn’t be tellin’ you to kiss him even as an example!” He protests, and you laugh quietly, giving him a reassuring kiss on the cheek before you press the point. 

“He was more upset by that than I was. And I was like, spectacularly upset.” You assure Sans. He grumbles quietly, but nods. “Look. We’ll be careful. Maybe we can do a test, see if there’s limits or a way to shield ourselves or something?” Sans lets out a bitter laugh at that. 

“look. if we’re trustin’ the guy… most believable thing he said last night was that he’s never doin’ it again. we shouldn’t… i mean, we can’t ask something like that from him. not yet, anyway.” He says, and you sigh. 

“You’re right. I’m just… worried. There’s been a lot of… what would Cap call it? Fucked up shit?” You say in a pretty damn weak Capra impression. Sans snickers anyway. “But… okay. Capra’s got the Word of God. I travelled through time to free your dad from prison. The, uh, the palace might be haunted by a spoopy ghost kid?-”

“spoopy?” He interrupts, looking skeptical. 

“Yep. Spoopy. And… Sans. Asgore.” You say quietly. “I’m in his good books. For now. But… what’s he gonna do when he finds out about Cap? And what about Frisk?”

“hm?” He’s looking drowsy, but he listens all the same. You clear your throat. 

“Babe. Look what happened to Cap because he didn’t have any idea what he could do. We can’t let that happen to Frisk. Someone’s gotta teach them. And… look. We’re family, but honestly I don’t have any real concept of what I can do either. I just… I think we should do something. You know. Secret-from-Asgore-style.” You murmur. He chuckles softly, then murmurs, 

“dunno. i mean. can you imagine a kid with cap’s powers activated? seems like a pretty good way to create a tyrant. think there’s a twilight zone about that. maybe kids knowin’ magic isn’t such a good idea. human kids, anyway. we just got no idea what you guys can even _do_.” You roll your eyes at him. 

“Well, bub, I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but Frisk already passed through the barrier, and I’m pretty damn sure their magic is _on_ already. I mean, we heard enough of what they did underground. Used a spear to fight Undyne, took control of Mettaton’s missiles, and I know your brother was going pretty easy on them, but they still put up a hell of a fight against blue magic, the way everyone tells it. Whatever I can do with monster magic, they can do it better, they learn faster, and they’re stronger. And, you know. There’s some bad people getting out of jail who might have it out for them. ” 

“heh, you callin’ me bub now?” He snickers, but then sighs when he sees you won’t be deterred. “i know. i know. you’re right. we can do secret jedi training with frisk.” He confirms. You nod, then make sure you have his attention. 

“We’ve gotta do this right. And we’ve gotta figure out the Asgore thing at some point, because… babe. In about nine months, we’ve got someone new hitting the scene. I don’t know much about them yet, but I feel pretty confident about one thing: they’re gonna be magic as heck.” 

Sans’ expression grows quite serious as he processes that, and then he growls, “asgore’s not gonna touch our kid.” Oh, you like that, you realize suddenly, your cheeks flushing. You like that tone, you like that protectiveness, and you very much like the term ‘our kid.’ Sans notices, of course, and he begins to smile in a way that promises some teasing, but you’ve got a thought you need to get out. 

“Yeah, well… look. The guy clearly _doesn’t_ have a problem killing kids, if he thinks it’s necessary for the greater good. And, unlike Frisk, he’s not banging our kid’s mom, either-”

“better not be!” Sans sputters, indignant, and you can’t help it, you laugh again. 

“But, seriously, baby. We’ve gotta be careful here. We’ve got a lot of people who need protecting right now.”

“i’m not lettin’ anyone hurt our kid.” He repeats again, totally sincere. “ _or_ frisk. or, fuck, capra.” You have to giggle at that last addendum, and you lean in, kissing his forehead. 

“I know. Me neither. So let’s just… be careful.” You mutter. He nods, then wraps both arms around you, hugging you tight in the darkness. 

\----------------------------------------

The next morning comes with the uninvited and unwelcome smell of burning, accompanied beautifully by the shrill scream of the smoke alarm in the distance. You jump to your feet, ready for firebombing, terrorists, that same old bullshit, but before Sans is even entirely awake, you hear Papyrus yelling,

“IT’S FINE! IT’S FINE! WE’VE JUST ANGERED THE SMALL ROBOT!” 

“ah man.” Sans whimpers, pulling his pillow over his head. You chuckle quietly, and will your heart to stop pounding before you lean over and rub his back. 

“I’m gonna go see what that is.” You tell him. “And maybe take the batteries out of the fire alarm.” 

“please.” He grumbles, and you grin at him, then step out into the hall, following the source of the burnt smell and the beeping of the fire alarm. It’s the kitchen, of course, and the alarm stops just as you round the corner to see Papyrus, running water over a pan in the sink, and a tired and disgruntled looking Capra.

“Well.” He says, giving you a smile that shows all his teeth and doesn’t reach his eyes at all, “I guess ‘new Peter’ isn’t gonna start by making everyone breakfast.” You sigh.

“We don’t want ‘new Peter.’” You say firmly. “We became friends with the current model. We like him.” He rolls his eyes, and says. 

“Look. Just figured I’d try to do something for everyone else instead of the other way around. Turns out that’s not one of my magic fuckin’ skills-”

“Cap. You do plenty.” You say firmly.

“Uh.” He says flatly, then sighs. “This is stupid. I’m gonna go back to my house.” 

“NO YOU AREN’T!” Papyrus scolds. “YOU’RE HAVING A REALLY BAD TIME! YOU NEED YOUR FRIENDS AROUND NOW MORE THAN EVER!” So, Capra must have told Papyrus already. Of course Paps was seeing the best in things, but - 

“He’s right, Cap. I don’t want you alone right now. Besides. Both of you. I don’t think that… okay. I know you’re upset, man, but… the King’s got his giant sized panties in a bunch about _me_ being a mage. I don’t think we should be telling everyone about this. Honestly, I don’t think we should be telling anyone about this. It’s not just the King we should be worried about. I can think of a whole bunch of humans who want what you’re selling, Cap.” You say quietly. He takes a breath to protest, and you narrow your eyes. “Hey, guy. However bad you’re feeling right now, I guarantee you’ll be feeling worse when the FBI’s like dissecting your brain for military applications.” He glares at you for a second, but he shuts his mouth. He must know you’re right. 

“Fine. Secret.” He grumbles. 

“Good. Now, what were you trying to make?” You say, walking over to the closet and grabbing an apron to throw over your sleep shorts and novelty t-shirt. He raises an eyebrow, then shrugs. 

“Eggs.” He mutters. Just then, Mettaton comes in, carrying a big box fan from the garage. 

“Oh! Good morning, _______.” He says, looking a little surprised to see you. He props the fan in the sliding door and turns it on, so that some of the burnt smell gets blown out of the kitchen. Then, turning, he does that thing you’re already getting used to, that split second glance that isn’t at your eyes or your soul, the quick search for that green dot. “Darling, I’m so sorry. I’m afraid I didn’t congratulate you properly last night. Although… goodness, you and Sans aren’t even married, how on earth…” He trails off when he sees the very unamused look on your face. Capra can’t help it. He lets out a single “ha,” before he remembers he’s supposed to be miserable. Mettaton turns to him and raises an eyebrow, though he looks brighter at the sign that Capra still has the capacity to laugh. 

“Sorry, Threep. ______. Just, you know. Humans. We don’t have to wait until marriage. Uh. I mean, I’ve got no idea how, uh, _that_ happened.” He says, then seems to realize he might be digging a deeper hole for himself when he looks at you. He finally just shrugs.

“SANS ATTEMPTED TO EXPLAIN IT TO ME BUT HE EVENTUALLY GAVE UP AND STARTED GROANING.” Papyrus chimes in helpfully. You consider cutting a doorway back up to your bedroom, then, seeing Mettaton’s hopeful expression, look back at Capra. 

“I’m sure you don’t need the mechanics explained to you.” You grumble, but then give Capra a smile. “C’mon, dude. Lemme teach you how to make eggs.” He glances at you, then slowly at Mettaton. The robot inclines his head a fraction of an inch, and Capra’s expression softens slightly. 

“Alright. Let’s make these eggs our bitches.” He decides, and gives you a slightly more sincere smile. Mettaton watches this, hesitates, then after a second of clear deliberation, he walks across the kitchen and gives Capra’s cheek a very quick kiss, then turns away, busying himself with starting the pot of coffee. Capra stands there, frozen, for a second, his expression blank, then he glances at Mettaton for a fraction of a second, gives him a crooked, strained smile, then nods back at you. “Hey. Eggs. C’mon, let’s do this, time is money.” 

Well… it’s a start.


	114. Wherein It's Just Some Mushy Bullshit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [take a knee](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

The weird thing about, well, living in a mansion full of monsters and his dead bosses’ (dead _friends’_ ) daughter, about sharing a bedroom with a robot ghost, playing fetch with a giant disembodied skull; it was how quickly it had all become so normal to him. How quickly he’d grown accustomed to coming back to a house full of people, to grabbing a slice of pizza or a bowl of spaghetti and eating with a group instead of alone in front of several monitors. 

He’d gotten used to all the activity, the laughing, the friendliness, the… _friends_. To trading nights at the bar for Mario Party with you and Sans, swapping the gym in his house to physical therapy while Undyne barked encouragement at him. Even switching from arguing with people on the internet about how dumb, say, midichlorians were, to having a totally earnest conversation about the same topic in ASL with an eight year old. 

And now, just as he’d grown accustomed to that new normal, two weeks ago you’d discovered what type of mage he was. Now, everything was just different enough to have him feeling like a stranger in his own skin. 

Part of it was him, of course. The Peter of two and a half weeks ago had never, ever second-guessed himself, and now? It felt like that was all that he was doing. He’d open his mouth and then he’d have to _think_ , because it was so easy to fuck up and say something that was technically a command. And he was just _done_ with that command bullshit. Oh, he’d ask nicely, if he needed to get something done. Maybe less nicely, if necessary. There were all sorts of ways to talk someone into something that didn’t involve magic. 

But, well, constantly thinking before he said… ugh, anything, it just sucked! He wasn’t nearly as funny when he was self-policing, of course. Or as charming, for what it was worth. Then again... This was the entire point, of course, the no-longer-being-charming, right Peter? 

It still sucked. 

But then there was the other thing, the fact that he wasn’t the only one second-guessing his actions in this house. 

You were trying your best to be cool with him, he knew that. You were even succeeding, except that, well, you were being so damn _nice_ to him, and that was freaking him out. You were never this nice to him! He fears what your behavior implies; he knows that you’re not the type to kick a guy when he’s down, and so he knows that you can see it, then, the moral panic simmering just below the surface. 

Papyrus too, god, that guy was the purest soul to have ever existed, and now, fuck if the skeleton wasn’t going above and beyond to show Capra how loved he was. The daily cooking lessons, the packed bag lunches with encouraging notes written on the napkins, the hugs and shouts of reassurance… it was so much. Too much. He didn’t deserve a friend like Paps. 

And then there was Sans. Sans, who was working so hard to act like nothing had changed. It was appreciated, honestly. He clung to the consistency in his friend’s behavior; the same teasing, the same focused concentration at work when the two of them had figured out something new and brilliant, the same lazy, insolent smiles and winks and snarky remarks and puns.

Except, okay, sometimes, like, oh, just a few minutes ago, there was something else in Sans’ eyes, something different and unsettling and entirely due to Capra’s creepy magic. 

Okay. Okay, so it had been his fault, letting his eyes wander, staring down at your - ha, that was the thing, for once it hadn’t even been that bad! Hadn’t been tits or ass or any of that shit for once! It was just after dinner, and it had been quickly agreed that everyone wanted to watch Firefly, especially since Sans hadn’t seen it, and, well, especially because everyone in the room could tell that Capra was out of sorts and needed a little cheering up right now. 

And so everyone was in the family room, and you’d just done this big dramatic stretch like a cat. Here was where he’d messed up: He’d noticed Undyne glance quickly at your stomach, and for a moment, unable to resist his morbid curiosity, he’d done the same. There he was, just thinking about how fucking bizarre it must be for you, knowing that you were in the process of making a brand new, totally unplanned monster-mash of a kid... and then a bony hand had moved pointedly into his field of view, sliding deliberately over the fabric of your t-shirt. You’d let out a sleepy sigh and relaxed into Sans’ hold, looking sweet and content. 

Sans, on the other hand, he’d looked much less content. He’d met Capra’s eyes, just for a split second, his pupils as hard and bright as Capra had ever seen them. The unspoken message was clear - _”you don’t even **think** about fucking with my family.”_ Oh, christ, okay dude. Like he was going to hurt your kid! Like he was going to do anything untowards at all when it came to you or the goddamn skaby.

Oh... but, hell, he couldn’t blame Sans either! This was a terrifying goddamn place to be bringing a new life into, and Sans, well, Sans at least seemed to be grasping the full horror of what Capra could do. Of course he’d be worried for his kid. And for you. And probably for himself. He didn’t know all that much about what Sans had gone through in the underground, but he knew this much; every monster he’d ever met was just about _done_ with humans telling them what to do. Okay. So that glare was understandable, he supposed. So… okay, fine, so they’d stay friends, but always there was that caveat; that Capra was to watch his fucking step.

God, Capra, thank _fuck_ you’d been so eager to figure out how to use your goddamn magic, huh?!

“Goodness, where is everyone?” Mettaton’s voice sounds from the kitchen, and something in Capra’s chest lurches unsteadily, like a guy getting up from a barstool after a couple of shots that he coulda sworn he didn’t even feel. He can feel everyone looking at him. 

“In here!” You call, after a deliberate moment where you meet his eyes, waiting for him to say something first, of course. He doesn’t. He can’t. Fuck, it’s only been, what… three days? Two nights, since Mettaton flew out to Hollywood for that consultation? It’s been no time at all, and hell, he’d even texted the guy a few times! Just, uh, to check in. Just to make sure…

Mettaton comes walking round the corner, gleaming and looking brilliant and, fuck, witness him, shiny and chrome - and he immediately locks eyes with Capra, and that metaphorical drunk   
asshole that has taken up residence in his chest staggers again, just when he thought he’d found his footing. 

“Hey!” He manages, bright and cheerful, and sits up a little, inches over to the side of the loveseat to make room for the robot. Mettaton studies him for a second, and Capra squirms inside, trying not to think about the fact that you and Sans and Papyrus and Undyne and Alphys and, fuck, L.D. and even Spot, they’re all watching this out of the corner of their eyes, he knows it and he hates it, fuck, fuck, can this not be a spectacle, can this not be something we all watch and judge in on, all these viewers at home?

Mettaton doesn’t care. He walks deliberately across the room, sits down next to Capra, and he kisses him without any further warning. It’s not showy or ostentatious. It’s not a stage kiss meant for everyone to see. He doesn’t even linger. It’s… comfortable. Genuine. Affectionate. And god, Mettaton looks so happy when he leans back, and… and what’s this, what the fuck is _this_ on your face, Peter, a big, earnest goofy-ass smile?

Oh god, why is he _so_ happy to have this shiny asshole back home?! His intoxicated, wavering, increasingly bad metaphor-soul is on the verge of passing the fuck out. Either that or understanding something that’s been eluding him for thirty-eight goddamn years. 

“I missed you.” Mettaton says softly, after a moment, then, watching Capra’s eyes, he backs away slightly, his expression closing off, his stance just a little apologetic. That’s too much, and he knows it. He knows that Capra’s been trying hard not to get freaked out by something as small as a kiss on the cheek in public, and that putting him on the spot like that, telling him that he’d been missed, that it isn’t fair. 

(He’s sorry, Peter, because he knows you’re weak and you’re petrified of any real connection, but more than that, that you’re scared shitless you’ll lose him, the one person who knows about your power and _still_ doesn’t think that there’s anything wrong with you.)

Well, that’s it. That’s the whole deal. Mettaton’s the only one who really has faith in Capra, and he cares enough to not resent Capra’s anxieties when it comes to contact. 

Fuck it. 

“Missed you too, Threep.” He says, loudly enough that if any of their friends chose to do so, they could certainly overhear. Then, because he doesn’t want this to be about their friends, about who’s overhearing what, he just thinks for a second - nah. The opposite. He stops thinking, he switches his big, stupid brain off for once, and he drapes his arm around Mettaton’s shoulders, those blessedly non-pointy fuckers (thanks, Alphys), and he gives him a quick... half-hug? Is that the right term? Fuck if he knows. Is this normal? God, did people do this? Sans was always doing this to you, right, just plopping his arm on your shoulders? Yes, Sans was literally doing it right now, so… Capra just lets his arm, er, linger there. Not pretending to do anything else, just staying in contact with his… with his, uh, his dude. Mettaton. Oh god. 

Okay, but everyone is staring. 

“I’m sorry, is there something terribly interesting over here?” Mettaton says irritably, and suddenly the room is full of guilty heads snapping back to pay attention to Firefly. Capra swallows, and his muscles tense, but then Mettaton rests his hand on Capra’s knee, giving it a quick, reassuring squeeze, and Capra forces himself to relax. It’s a struggle for the next few episodes - he keeps finding himself tense, ready to bolt. Fuck. This came so easy to everyone else! Why was it such a fight for him to be okay with this? 

That night, before bed, Mettaton asks him. Well, the conversation has to wait for a while; the bedroom door clicks shut, and Mettaton’s mouth is on his, the robot’s fingers are sliding through his hair, and god, _this_ is where his comfort zone is! He can do this, it’s the other shit, the feelings shit that he can’t do - except somewhere along the line, fairly recently, even this part with just the kissing and the fumbling and the loud breathing, there were feelings there too! Fuck, is there a single thing that he _can_ handle right now?

“Peter,” Mettaton says very clearly, finally stopping the onslaught of kisses to look him seriously in the eyes. “I _did_ miss you.”

“I know.” Capra breathes, pulling away and sitting down on the side of the bed, his head spinning slightly. “Fuck, you look good, Threep!”

“Ah.” This doesn’t seem to be exactly what Mettaton wants to hear. Capra winces, then he clears his throat and tries again. 

“I got used to having you here.” He admits, quietly. “I didn’t like you being gone. The, uh, nights. I didn’t sleep much.” Mettaton grimaces. 

“Oh, Peter.” He says, and he sits down next to Capra. He presses a soft kiss to Capra’s throat, then meets his eyes. “I told you to call me, if you were still-”

“I know.” Capra interjects. 

The nightmares have been... bad. He didn’t call anyway. 

“Peter…” Mettaton starts again, after a moment, and he resumes running his fingers through Capra’s hair, this time not lustfully, this time soothing and deliberate. He shifts slightly, encouraging Capra to lie down at his side. He’s been working on this for a while, and Capra doesn’t flinch anymore at the intimacy; he stretches out, and waits for Mettaton to do the same. He’s still not sure how Mettaton trained him to do this, but, hey, props to the guy.

When the two of them are at eye level, Mettaton takes a gamble. He kisses Capra so tenderly, so caringly that Capra can hardly bear it. It takes some time to process, to justify it in his head (“Yes, Peter, you don’t normally allow this, but he’s _different_ ”). He doesn’t raise a protest, at least, but it’s hard for him still, and Mettaton sees that. 

The robot sighs. “I’ve been thinking for a while. I said something very cruel to you, once, didn’t I?” He pronounces slowly. “I mocked you. I asked who hurt you. It was wrong of me.”

“Hey. It’s okay, Threep. You didn’t have all the information yet, about the level of fucked up human you were dealing with. Neither did I.” Capra drawls sardonically. Mettaton doesn’t laugh, of course. He merely watches Capra for a long, calculating moment. Capra’s considering breaking the silence himself when Mettaton speaks up again. 

“What happened to you, darling? Please?” He says, the slightest hint of desperation leaking into his voice. 

Capra can’t help it. He lets out a laugh that trails off into a few hoarse, individual “ha”s. “Uh. Think that answer depends on the therapist I’m paying. There’s been a few working theories. I guess, uh, you know…” Fuck, he hates this. “Didn’t get a lot of love or attention growing up. Even less consistency. Lost my mom real young, uh, had a dad who thought children shouldn’t be seen or heard. And then, you know, later… well, lots of stuff. The barrier. And so on.” He manages, and then he can’t stand it, he needs something to excuse him, to get him out of talking about this, and at the same time, there’s this feeling that this is different, that Threep would never mock him for this thoroughly mundane story about being a poor little rich boy whose dad resented him and filled the void with an endless parade of younger and younger “stepmothers” for little Petey. It was so fucking banal. It was a shit origin story. It was not a comic book he would have read as a kid.

He can’t do it. He shuts himself up by kissing the other man roughly, greedily, and then he growls in Mettaton’s ear, “I missed you, okay? I missed you every way a guy could miss you.” Mettaton takes in a breath that could be understood as hopeful, realizing the implication. They haven’t _done_ this, not since Mettaton trotted out the brand new dick the day everything fell to shit.

“Are you sure?” Mettaton murmurs halfheartedly, when Capra makes his interest quite clear, pressing up against him and grabbing a handful of robot ass, kissing the strong line of his jaw. “I, er, got the impression you weren’t interested, after the last time… I know, um… I know it’s not the same with me, er… ohh, darling, that feels wonderful, but, wait a moment.” He manages to get his thoughts together enough to get Capra to stop - he falls still, a crooked smile on his face, his hand still in a very audacious place. “Peter. I know I’m not flesh and blood. I’m not exactly what you want. I know you were put off by my body, after the last time-”

“What?!” Capra barks out a laugh, looking bewildered, and Mettaton cringes. 

“Um. Just. Er. It’s been _weeks_ and you haven’t even touched me like-”

“Oh, god.” Capra groans, then kisses the other man again, slow and deliberate; he allows himself to show Mettaton, just for the moment, how ridiculously, desperately reliant on him he’s grown. “Threep. You’re fucking perfect. If I had to pick one body to uh, be with for the rest of my life, it would be yours. You’re _perfect_.” He whispers once he’s done, and he’s telling the truth, he really is, which is, fuck, it’s horrifying. “I, uh, I just haven’t…” Mettaton raises an eyebrow, already blushing and looking quite flustered from the compliment, and Capra lets out a hoarse laugh. “Uh. I know our generous hostess can run out of magic if Sans isn’t doing his skeletonly duties.” He points out, and Mettaton thinks about this for a second, then snickers. “I was just, uh, trying to see if maybe I could run out too…” He begins, and Mettaton’s eyes go wide. 

“Oh. Oh, my, of course. Well, shit, then, we really shouldn’t...” He begins, understanding, but Capra shakes his head. 

“I… really missed you, fuck. I _need_ you. More than I need that peace of mind right now. I don’t want to stay away from you forever. That would suck.” He mutters, and then blinks for a second, caught off guard - he’s telling the truth. Again. He needs Mettaton. Well, how about that. “And goddamn, I love it when you swear.” He says, grins, and then finally, at last, adds; “Also, condoms exist. Wanna see if they work on magic?”

It turns out that condoms don’t work on magic. Go fucking figure. 

That night, he can’t bring himself to care. The sex is foreign - a lot less snapping at each other and cutting remarks and big, insincere grins. In fact, there’s none of that shit. It’s just him and Threep, and once he turns his brain off again, once he stops worrying, it’s _so good_. It almost makes him mad, how good it is. And then, he lets go even of that anger, and when they’re finished, when the bed’s been remade and he’s showered and they’re ready to sleep or go into screensaver mode or whatever, when that shit happens, he only thinks about it for a second before he moves a comfortable arm around Mettaton’s waist, and it’s quiet, except for the hum of processors whirring somewhere within the robot, of his… dude, thinking very, very hard.

“Peter?” He finally speaks up.

“Yep.” 

“I… was wondering. And… you’re more than welcome to say ‘no.’ Actually… no, I’m sorry, this is very stupid-”

“C’mon. Spit it out, Threep.” He grumbles playfully, eyes shut. There’s the now-familiar feeling of Mettaton stroking his forearm for a moment, and then the robot pronounces;

“Do you want… to go to… a karaoke bar with me tomorrow night?” 

Welp. Couldn’t have seen that coming. He bursts out laughing, and Mettaton freezes under his arm, so he quickly says,

“Uh, yeah. Sure, Threep. Sounds fun.”

“...So we’ll go out then tomorrow.” Mettaton tries out the words carefully, just in case Capra didn’t get the implication. “The two of us will go out.” 

“Yep. A date.” Capra says, and right now, he’s feeling relaxed enough, fond enough of Mettaton that this doesn’t seem like the most terrifying prospect in the world. “Christ, this thing we’re doing is pretty damn backwards, isn’t it?” 

“It’s what it is.” Mettaton says, sounding drowsy but very, very happy now. Capra chuckles and nods, closing his eyes.

A date.

He can do this.


	115. Wherein Sans Is In A Good Mood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [huddle up](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

Okay. Okay, you’re glad that Mettaton is coming back today. Like, holy hell are you glad that Mettaton is back home, because it means that the theatrics are going to end.

The past two weeks have been exhausting. It’s not that you don’t feel for Capra. You do! He’s your friend, no matter how weird that fact might be, and the guy is going through about seven crises at once right now. But… oh, god, there is nothing more tiring than this grownass man trying to pretend he hasn’t developed feelings for another grownass man. The week and a half leading up to Mettaton’s Hollywood trip had been trying enough - well, Capra had gone full-on “I am a good and useful person” in an attempt to amend for the months of accidental mind control. It really, it wasn’t his fault that this wasn’t an easy thing to amend for. He’d tried though. 

As a result of Capra’s trying, there was an almost constant stream of extra chores you’d had to redo. Like, here was a guy who was dedicated to clean energy, who was legitimately trying to save the world, and who seemed to be laboring under the delusion that cat fur was recyclable. You’d had to sort out the recycling not once, not twice, but four times; each time, there’d been some essential element he’d messed up. And then there was the cleaning up. He’d never held a broom before, that much was clear. His efforts with wiping down the counters were disastrous. Mettaton was even teaching him how to do their laundry - not Cap’s suits, of course, or even his expensive jeans, but the sheets and towels, at least. This was the only thing that Capra didn’t seem as eager as a puppy to do, which Sans found absolutely hilarious. 

“I don’t get it.” You’d told him, when he’d started snickering as Capra hauled a load of sheets down the hall, a sour look on his face. “We should be really thankful he figured that out, because, again, god only knows what I touched back when I was doing his laundry. Now it’s his problem.” 

“‘s nothing. don’t think he’s touchin’ anything either.” He’d laughed, arching a brow, and then a positively evil look had crept into his eyes, and he’d leaned over to kiss you in a way that was not at all polite to do in front of anyone. Now, you could have stopped him, protested, tried to figure out why he had suddenly decided to kiss you like that in the middle of a Sunday afternoon, at the dining room table, when you were supposed to be figuring out a date for your wedding. But, well, wedding stuff was boring, and this was way, way more fun. 

It wasn’t until Capra, on his way back from the laundry room, spotted you and let out a quiet, despairing groan, that you understood Sans’ game. Once Cap’s footsteps had receded once more, you swatted your fiance’s arm, breathing a little quickly. 

“You’re mean.” You’d scolded him. Sans had shrugged. 

“guy’s bein’ a martyr. this is probably the longest he’s gone without getting laid. he’d be in a much better mood if he had a better reason to clean those sheets-”

“Oh my god.”

“ok, but am i wrong?”

“Why would he even do that? He and Mettaton are attached at the hip right now.” You’d pointed out, and Sans had raised an eyebrow until this clicked too. “Oh. Right. Magical…”

“ejaculation.” He completed sunnily, looking like the cat who’d just caught the canary. You rolled your eyes. He was being so… cheerful these days. Like he didn’t have a care in the world. Which gave your fiance plenty of time to get up to his usual routine of jokes and pranks. 

“Well, then you extra shouldn’t tease him. He’s trying to be a good guy.”

“he’s teasin’ himself.” Sans snickered, then raised his eyebrows. “you know, me, personally? i tried to do that ‘stop having sex for the good of my true love’ routine, and it went baaaaad for me. you’d think he’d learn from my mistakes.” He’d said, and looked you over pointedly, before clearing his throat in a way that you just knew was a lead-in to a proposition that would be hard to turn down if he said it out loud. 

“Sans. Baby. You’re being super distracting right now. You have to decide if you want to be a horny skeleton or one that’s eventually, someday, getting married.” You pointed out, shoving a pile of brochures back in front of him. After all, you could tell where _that_ line of conversation had been heading. Conversation had been heading that way a lot, recently. You weren’t entirely sure _why_ Sans had made the jump from “loving and attentive fiance” to “total horndog” these past few days, but you weren’t exactly complaining. It was nice to see him so relaxed, so happy, just... there were things to get done!

He’d grinned at you, and for a second, you’d really thought that he was about to stick with “horny skeleton,” so you’d driven that option away by reminding him, “It’s only that, oh, last month you were getting really upset thinking I didn’t want to marry you, remember? And now that you’ve gone and knocked my ass up, I’m the one who’s getting scandalized looks from every monster I see who can’t figure out how I’m carting around The Dot without a wedding ring on my finger? And, you know, that I _want to be married_ before this kid shows up? Or before I get too huge for wedding dresses?” 

That had gotten him back on track. He did genuinely feel bad about the side-eye that you were getting from most monsters. They weren’t even trying to be rude, it was just that… again, unmarried and pregnant wasn’t a thing that happened to monsters, and everyone, immediately, had questions, and they’d recently come to a peak. You’d volunteered to take a moody Mettaton to the airport a few days ago, just because you’d rather see that side of the fallout than the Capra half. It had been a trying experience in general. 

The airport was an hour out from Ebbot Township (or a second out, if you could cut a magic doorway in space time) which meant that there were fewer monsters in the building, as a rule. You’d been caught by surprise when, seeing Mettaton through security, you’d noticed several burly dog monsters sniffing passengers suspiciously and going through carry on luggage. Mettaton had rolled his eyes. 

“It’s just theater, darling.” He’d sighed, and then he’d given you a quick hug, and a kiss on each cheek. “Do be good while I’m gone. And wish me luck. And take your vitamins. And keep an eye on Peter.” Oof, that last one. 

“I’ll do my best.” You’d promised, and watched him through the line - he’d set off the metal detector, of course - before turning to leave. 

Oh, god, behind you, a small crowd had gathered without your noticing. They were Mettaton superfans, a large cluster of humans with a few monsters mixed in, all looking absolutely delighted to have seen your friend. Of course they were. Mettaton was a popular entertainer, and he was almost _certainly_ the type to let his fans know which airport he’d be at for the photo ops. What you hadn’t counted on was them knowing who you were.

“-that’s the girl from the fight in the underground-”

“-the skarm-” (That was public knowledge?!)

“-so lucky to know him-”

“-with the skeleton, but not the hot one-”

Okay, that had pissed you off. Sans was certainly the, uh, hot skeleton! He wasn’t the NOT hot skeleton, at least! ...Oh, jeez, did they think Papyrus was the hot one? You’re turning, opening your mouth to give them a piece of your mind, when a tiny bat monster comes fluttering up shyly to you and squeaks, 

“C-congratulations on the little soul!”

And well, after that, shit had hit the fan. You’d been pestered by the small group of fans with questions you’d barely managed to answer, until you’d panicked, excused yourself to the bathroom, and quickly teleported home, telling Sans you were never going anywhere without him ever again. The nonsense had only just begun, though. You’d been laying low for a few days as rumors circulated the Mettaton fanboards: that you were secretly married to Sans, that you were secretly married to Mettaton, that the baby belonged to another human who should not be named but was often seen photographed with you….

You had no idea why Mettaton enjoyed fame so much.

But now, at last, Mettaton was on his way home, and hopefully he and Capra would cause some sort of scandal soon that would stop the internet from caring about you. You feel bad thinking that way, but really, enough is enough. Mettaton seems to understand your distress; he’d advised you not to pick him up from the airport, because, well, the Incident, so he was taking a car home himself. 

Sans was looking bemused that Mettaton’s return was even being treated as a big deal. The guy had come and gone from your house dozens of times before, after all. This was just the first time he’d had someone in particular who was waiting for him. Capra was, well, he was shitting himself and trying very hard not to look like he was shitting himself. He was immaculately groomed, wearing a shirt so black it just had to be brand new, jeans that were tailored to fit him, those same damn matching black chucks.

“It’ll be fine.” You tell him. 

“No idea what you’re talking about.” Capra drawls, and resumes drumming his fingers on his knee, only vaguely focused on Firefly on the TV. Sans snorts, and takes the opportunity to nip at the skin of your neck while nobody’s watching. Silly, frisky skeleton. You turn to look at him, raising both eyebrows.

“You’re _gonna_ have to tell me what’s gotten into you at some point.” You drawl, and he just grins, his eyes bright. 

\---------------------------------------------------------

What had gotten into him, of course, was that little green dot. 

Oh, he’d known that he was going to be smug, he’d known it for a fact, but there was a difference between objectively knowing that he was going to be happy, and actually seeing the results.

Every day, he woke up, and first he’d check on your soul, on the graceful, flaring sprays of light in your chest, just barely masking that core of black, threatening magic. Then, down; and there was the dot. Er. The Dot. It seemed like the kid should already be capitalized. Every day, the Dot was a little bigger, burned a little brighter, made him that much prouder, the future that much more concrete. 

He was going to have a family. Well, he had a family, but… this was real. He was going to be a dad, and everyone knew it. Or, er, they were on their way to knowing it. Someday soon, there wouldn’t be a person around who wouldn’t know how incredible his fiancee - gonna be ‘wife’ soon - was. There wouldn’t be a monster around who didn’t know how lucky he was, that for some damn reason, the rules didn’t apply to the two of you, that you were able to have a kid even though literally everything, everyone said it was impossible. 

And goddamn, every day you were just more beautiful. He couldn’t keep his hands off you, much less his mouth (or, uh, other parts). He knew, he _knew_ there was so much right now that needed worrying about, but he found himself just blissful, unwilling to investigate any weirdness about racists or spooky ghosts. Not when you were illuminated from the inside, when every single thing about you kept drawing him closer. He was being stupid, he told himself. But then… you’d toss your hair and he’d smell your shampoo, or you’d be giggling about something on the other side of the room, or you’d be going through wedding documents, your jaw set in concentration, and it would take fucking everything he had not to just take your hand and lead you somewhere secluded. 

Best of all, he decided, was the way that other people looked at the two of you now, with surprise, then jealousy, then awe (and then in the humans’ case, for those rare humans who’d been advised by their monster friends what was up, blatant confusion). Yeah, that was right. A guy like him had not only talked you into marrying him, but you were gonna have a family with him…

He couldn’t come down from the high. It was all just so…. perfect. 

His phone rings, and Capra jumps. Poor Cap. He should tease him less. They could commiserate on being lovesick, if he could just get Cap to admit he was in love in the first place. Or, er, in “like.” He didn’t think Capra did love. 

“s’not mettaton.” He tells Capra, and stands up to take the call, his brow furrowed. (“Don’t care.” Capra protests.) He doesn’t recognize the number, but it still seems somehow familiar. You look up at him as he stands, clearly wondering if you should follow, but he shakes his head as Undyne and Alphys and Papyrus all come wandering into the family room. He can handle this. He’ll be back. You smile up at him and nod, and his soul lurches helpessly, and he has to remind himself that he’s got hours left tonight just to snuggle with you and watch old TV. He trots into the dining room, and answers the call. 

“hey?” 

“Sans. Hello.” Oh. Oh shit. He knows the number now, that’s the palace’s official number. Which means that this deep voiced prick on the line;

“what’s up, asgore?” He asks, straightening his back, a jet of anxiety puncturing the happiness that’s just been sitting in his chest for two weeks. The king hesitates, then clears his throat.

“Er. Royal intelligence advised me today that, er, congratulations are in order for you. And your wife.” He begins, and Sans can’t help it,

“- _fiancee,_ ” he interjects, so that Asgore can practically hear the sharp toothed smile, the baiting intent behind the word. 

“Right. Yes.” The king sounds dismayed. “So… I wondered if I might… discuss this turn of events with you, and your fiancee. In private.” Sans takes a breath. 

“whattya need to say, asgore?” He says, quiet and friendly and insincere. 

“Er. Just to discuss some, er… logistics. With the new child.”

“not sure i like the sound of that.” Sans begins, and Asgore clears his throat. He already sounds guilty to Sans’ mind when he starts up again. 

“I must consider, at all times, the safety of all of my subjects-”

“yeah. and our kid might or might not be one of your subjects. or a fuckin’ threat to safety. asgore.” Sans suddenly finds himself dark and cold and furious. “you don’t start shit when it comes to my kid. this isn’t one of those ‘sacrifices for the greater good’ things. understand? this is my kid. my mate. you can play this like either of them are a threat, but i guarantee you’ll regret it. just… just this one time, don’t be a dick.” He snarls. Asgore hesitates for a moment, then responds, equally quietly,

“I have a kingdom to consider. We don’t know _what_ that child will be like, what threat it might pose-”

“you don’t gotta worry about the threat my kid might pose, asshole. worry about me, if i ever find out you tried to fuck with it...” Sans snaps, then trails off, narrows his eyes. “you’ll play nice. bring frisk over for playdates. let ‘em be happy about their new family member.”

“It sounds as if you are giving your king orders.” Asgore says slowly, and Sans barks out a laugh. 

“‘s your call. just, uh, if there’s one thing i’ve learned recently it’s that actions have consequences. and, uh, just because you’re the type of guy who’d let both your kids die doesn’t mean i am.” He snarls, and he hangs up the phone, his head reeling. He almost immediately regrets those words, how that conversation had gone down, but… Asgore had started it, he thinks petulantly. “Logistics.” What the fuck was that, Sans? Where had all that come from?!

Oh, christ, he’d have to tell you the secret was out. He walks slowly back into the family room, and sits next to you. You glance at him, and quickly, he kisses your brow. He can feel Capra’s stare on you from across the room, and he doesn’t even think; he stretches his hand out protectively over your belly, his good mood punctured thoroughly. What had Asgore even wanted? Why’d you have to fly off the handle like that, idiot!? You’d fucked it up! Suddenly the full weight of the threats on the horizon, his responsibilities, his concerns, they all come flooding back. He didn’t know why he’d been ignoring them in the first place - whatever happy place he’d been occupying, that bubble had been thoroughly punctured. Other guys got to be just a proud dad. He had more to worry about than that. 

He’d figure it out. He’d figure it out.


	116. Wherein There Is A POOL PARTY SUMMER SLAM BIKINI BEACH BLASTOFF 2KXX

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look. I don't even know about that chapter title. Like. I have got NOTHING. I'm sorry. I'm sorry readers. 
> 
> [hit the showers](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ Stream tonight,](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington) I'll be there shortly, promise, I just need some food, my dudes.   
> Actually, wow, this chapter note is going to be so ephemeral. Useful for a few hours, useless for basically the rest of eternity. Welp. Things get made and then they get unmade. That's the universe, baby.

“Sans.”

“i know.”

“Look. I love you.”

“i knowwwww.” He whines, burying his head under a pillow. This is much different pillowtalk than you’ve been having the past week. 

“I’m just saying, there’s one thing you don’t say to your fucking king.” 

“babe.”

“Which is pointing out that his kids died and hinting that it’s his fault?” 

He lets out a long, quiet whine. You relent. 

“Look, bonehead. I am so there for you defending me and our future-kid. Seriously. Like, A+ defensive maneuvers, until the kid thing. But he’s your king. He’s the only thing we have when the monsters are threatened, and since I’ve come down pretty hard in camp monster, he’s the only thing I have too. You’ve gotta-”

“oh god don’t say it-”

“-apologize.” You talk over him pointedly. He pulls his head out from under the pillow and settles it back on top, a resigned, miserable look on his face. 

“yeah. i know. we need him. but babe, he even insinuates our kid’s a problem again and i might go for his royal throat. like, i’m talkin’ thin, thin ice.” You look at him and you see that he’s very serious about this at least. 

“Sans.” You sigh, then look him over again. “Look. We’re not gonna let anyone or anything hurt the Dot. I promise you that. We just need to be… diplomatic. Like, for example, we kinda need the king to… marry us, since that’s not something that’s been okayed on the human side of things. But-” You cut off any expected protest. “Look, he’s not fucking with our baby. Like, that’s just not gonna happen. He even tries, and we’ll be having a really different conversation. Deal?” 

He thinks about this, then nods. “sure. deal. i can eat my pride.” 

“Well, yeah, you’d better. That was… savage, dude.” You say, and he rolls his eyes, then nods. 

“i know. shit. i do.” He grumbles.

“Well, look. We wanted to make sure that Frisk was okay even though King I-Hate-Humans-Having-Powers is hooking up with their mom. So like. How about this: I butter up Tori tomorrow, invite Frisk and their friends over to have a pool party which I _know_ they’ve been wanting forever, you go off to the palace, say your thing to King Dad, win-win, yeah?” He pulls a face, and you snicker. 

“yours is way more fun.”

“Well, I didn’t rub the king’s nose in his damn kids dying.” You point out and he groans quietly again, enough that you relent and inch over, cuddling up with him. “I know. Heat of the moment.” You murmur. “And I’m glad that you already care enough about this little nerd to speak up for them like that. Still.”

“i know.” He grumbles. “apologize.” 

\------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Toriel is just, like, a thousand percent on board with the pool party plan. And, well, if Toriel is cool with it, Frisk is just beside themselves. Oh, they’ve been over to hang out on the beach dozens of times, but well, that was the beach - boring! But getting to take all their friends over to a house where the girl with the skarm and Undyne AND Mettaton lived (er, _did_ he live here? Well, he had certainly been around a lot recently), and there was a pool, and Lesser Dog, and Spot?

You’d heard them screaming happily from the other side of the phone so loud that you’d had to hold it away from your ear. 

You’re setting up a table and a cooler for drinks and snacks for the kids, who are due to arrive any minute, when Capra ambles out to lend a hand, wordlessly handing over a bag of ice with a crooked smile. You take it, and begin filling the cooler before it occurs to you that he’s just done something helpful around the house without either being told or messing it up. Okay. So, it was carrying ice, but… hey, that was something still!

“Thanks, Cap. Though, I mean, heads up, you might want to clear out pretty soon, there’s gonna be a bunch of kids over in like five minutes and I know that’s not exactly your jam-”

“Eh.” He shrugs, then reconsiders. “Wait. How old.” 

“Uh, Frisk’s age. Eight or nine?” 

“Yeah, I can handle that.” He decides. “It’s the babies that gross me out. Just like, boogers, all over their face all the time. And then they reach their hands into their mouths, and then they touch your face? And like, a baby’s hand is always moist, have you noticed that? Like, you know it’s not because they just washed their hand. It’s because they’ve been dipping it in _some_ bodily fluid, and…” He trails off, looking at you, and then sighs. “And I’m talking to a pregnant lady.” He completes with a groan.

“Hey.” You decide to cheer him up. “If the kid takes after Sans, probably gonna be way less moist.”

“Oh, yeah! There’s a major perk. That should be on the dating a monster brochure. What if it’s all like Sans, your kid? Think about it. No diaper changes. Wait. Does Sans poop?” 

“Oh my god.” Still, it’s good to see Capra feeling more like himself. The past few days of sulking have been _bad_. In fact, this is the most chipper you’ve seen him since, well, since he figured out his magic. Except, well, his smile looks just a little strained still. “So, what are your plans for the day?” 

There goes the smile. 

“I uh… I am going on a date.” He pronounces carefully, not meeting your eyes. You try very hard not to laugh.

“Hey, man, that’s cool. Where are you guys going? Oh, god, you’re not taking him to the Cock and Bull, are you, because seriously - what are you doing?” As you talk, you notice him sidling very quickly over to the front of the poolhouse. 

“Neighbor’s outside.” He says, through gritted teeth. You groan. 

“Oh, god. This is ridiculous. Hang on.” Ignoring the way he begins to mouth the word “no”, you turn on your heel and begin to walk towards the adjoining yard. It takes a while. God only knows why your parents had found it necessary to buy such an enormous house. It honestly didn’t seem like them, in retrospect. They had used cars, wore hoodies and jeans to work, but they’d bought a place with a damn pool, even though the ocean was right there!

...Well. Another thing you’d never get to ask them. For now, you’d lectured Sans on diplomacy, and while he was off sweet talking the king, it was time for you to engage in some diplomacy of your own. The neighbor guy’s trimming the hedges, his long black hair tied up in a ponytail, looking lost in his work - though his eyes do flick up, noticing you, before he gets back to it. He could be anywhere between thirty and fifty, and honestly, he’s kind of handsome, in, like, a The Patriot way. God, he is definitely not named Fancy Ravensauce… but shit, what _was_ his real name again?

“Hey there!” You call out cheerfully, and he looks up from the hedges, puzzled. 

“Hello?” He says tentatively. You wince internally, then try again.

“I, um, just wanted to give you a heads up, there’s gonna be a bunch of kids playing in the pool in like ten minutes, so it might get a little noisy. Also… god, I’m so sorry, I’ve lived next to you for god knows how long and I’ve never said hi. So, uh. Hi?” He studies you for a second, then gives you a slow smile. 

“Hi. I suppose it’s rude of me too. Dennis Smith.” He sticks out his hand, and you silently thank the heavens that he’s wearing a shirt while gardening this time, which makes this all so much less awkward. Still, plenty awkward though. 

“_______.” You supply, shaking his hand. “Also… I don’t know, I feel like I kind of have a lot to apologize for. All of a sudden, your neighbors got a lot noisier, huh?”

“...I did notice.” Dennis says quietly. “With, er. All the monsters. And…” He trails off and nods at your back yard. You groan. 

“Capra? He’s harmless. Just too nosy for his own good.” He blinks at you, then laughs.

“Oh, no, not him. He asked me if I wanted his business card once, I suppose, but… well, I suppose it’s none of my business why the CEO of EbbCo’s next door.” He says with a shrug. “I meant, er, the army, on Christmas?” 

“Oh! Yeah. Sorry!” You say quickly, feeling an irresistible urge to hide the skarm behind your back. Something about taking to this guy just makes you feel like you’d inconvenienced him just by being the type of person to attract an army.

“Don’t be.” He shrugs. “Not your fault. I called the police, of course, but it’s a shame, they don’t seem to be very concerned as soon as they hear the word monster. This town certainly has changed. So many more tourists since the barrier came down. And the police, no longer even concerned...” He says, looking across the bay to the lights of Ebott Township for a moment.

“Well. Thanks for calling them anyway.” You say and he shrugs.

“It was nothing. And, er, thank you for the warning about the children. I suppose I’ll go inside. I’m a day trader, so I like to garden on the weekends, but I don’t tolerate loud noises or a lot of activity very well. I’m afraid I’m something of an introvert.” He says, and you wince again. 

“Again, sorry.” 

“Don’t be.” 

This is the worst damn conversation of all time. 

“Anyway. Pleasure finally meeting you, ________.” He gives you a half smile, waves his shears in an (accidentally threatening) goodbye, and turns around, strolling back to his house.

“Yikes.” You mutter to yourself, and then walk back over to the pool. “Cap, you can stop hiding. He went inside.” 

“Wasn’t hiding.” Capra lies, then nods at the house. “Kids are coming.” Sure enough, the sliding glass door opens and Toriel ushers a pack of small humans and monsters in swimsuits into the backyard, all yelling excitedly. Undyne and Papyrus stroll out a second later - you’ve recruited them for lifeguard and general child-supervising duty. Once you’ve been tackled by Frisk and greeted shyly by most of the kids (besides M.K., who knows you well enough to give you the gentle headbutt that they substitute for a hug), you quickly duck into the poolhouse to change into a swimsuit, and then walk back out. Capra, in spite of his big talk, has already made a run for it, and the kids are all either in the pool or getting fitted for floaties by Papyrus - some of the monsters just aren’t designed for swimming, but if it hadn’t stopped Paps, it wasn’t going to stop them either. You grin, then spot Toriel by the side of the pool, her feet in the water, and walk over to join her, trying to avoid the splash fight that Undyne’s already started with half the kids.

“Oh, my niece, thank you so much for inviting the children over. I have been trying to allow Frisk to play with all of their friends, but with so many of the Men in Black back on the streets… They’ve been building a treehouse at their human friend Asha’s house, but last time, their mother told me that some of the Men had moved back in next door. ” She trails off, and you grimace. 

“Yeah, I actually heard about that. I work with Asha’s brother, Cody. Oh, sh- shoot.” You correct yourself quickly. “I didn’t realize, is one of these kids Asha, I should have invited him over-”

“ALREADY DID HE’S ON HIS WAY!” Undyne bellows from the center of a epic splash battle in the shallow end. You grin at her, then sigh. 

“It’s awful, though. Well, you know that you and Frisk and any of their friends are welcome over anytime, right?” You check quickly, and glance at Frisk, basking in being the center of attention in the middle of the splash fight, trying to climb onto Undyne’s shoulders. Toriel smiles and looks fondly at you.

“Thank you, dear.” She says, then gives you a knowing grin. “I know how much I wanted to practice being around children when I was… well.” She says. Oh. Um.  
“You caught me.” You say weakly, though you’re pretty sure that hanging out with your little cousin is nothing like the kind of practice you’ll need for a mystery baby (who might or might not poop). She beams at you. 

“Do not be so nervous, my niece. It will all be fine. And you and Sans will have no small amount of help, I am certain. My dear, when are you getting married?” She checks quietly, and you make a face. 

“Uh, as soon as possible. I actually, um… I kind of needed to talk to you about that.” Her face lights up, and you realize that she’s off in an entirely different direction. Oh, gosh, this is bad. “Um, so Sans and Asgore got in a fight yesterday?!” You say very quickly. She blinks. 

“Oh dear. Over what?” She says quietly. 

“Er. Asgore found out about…” You trail off and gesture vaguely at your stomach. “And he called up wanting to discuss logistics?”

“Oh, for holding the marriage ceremony sooner rather than later?” Toriel says, looking puzzled. 

“Uh. No. For um. Our kid. Look, I heard this secondhand, but it sounds like he wasn’t too pleased that there’s something new coming on the scene that he doesn’t know what it can do? You know?” You say tentatively. “He wanted to discuss like… limitations, I think? Maybe… worse?” Toriel’s face is growing stonier and stonier as you talk. 

“Oh. Oh that damn fool!” She finally says. “This is just like him. Oh, he would!” Uh oh. Toriel’s pissed. Asgore was going to have a shitty day for sure. 

“Okay, well, look, Sans got really protective and said something SUPER awful to him that I made him go apologize for-”

“What did he say?”

“I won’t repeat it. It was the worst.” You say quickly. “Anyway. Um. He might not be in the mood to get us hitched.” Toriel bristles again at that. 

“He is still the king. He owes a duty to-”

“His obedient subjects. And Sans was a sh….ugar.” You say, as a kid drifts too close. She thinks about this for a long moment, then purses her lips. 

“Do not worry, my child. One way or another, you will be married. Just give me the time and the place.” She says firmly, and you can’t help it, you smile at her. 

“Well, we’re going to need you for more than that. You’re the most family I have right now.” You say gently, and her face softens.

“Oh, my dear.” She sighs, and covers your hand on the side of the pool with her own massive paw. “I fear I have not been the best aunt so far.” 

“You’ve been wonderful.” You assure her. “It’s just not every day someone gets a brand new grown-ass niece.” You say, then, remembering all the things you want to cover, plow forward. “But, Tori. You remember the day I almost skewered that soccer mom.” 

“Yes, and I am so sorry for my behavior-” Toriel begins, but you cut her short. 

“No. It’s just that… that happened because I had no idea what I was doing. And… I know how Asgore feels about humans learning magic, but is Frisk, well, _safe_ not knowing...” You begin, but trail off, looking across the pool as the splashing suddenly stops. 

In the heat of the battle, something must have gone wrong, because Frisk is now sitting on a small iceberg, looking absolutely bewildered as to how they made it. For a second, the pool is still and silent, then Undyne lets out a congratulatory roar and everyone else joins in, using the piece of ice as a new platform in their splash war. 

You look at Toriel. Her eyes are very, very wide. 

“Perhaps…” She says quietly, squeezing your hand. “Perhaps this is something we should begin to work on together.”


	117. Wherein Sans and Asgore Sit Politely in Some Grass and Chat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [butt pats all round](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ Stream tonight,](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington) I'll be there for a while at the beginning and the end but the middle is gonna be the adventures of "TST playing DND elsewhere!"

“ok, bud, we’ve done this like a million times before.” 

“Name?” The Royal Guardsman demands. 

“it’s sans. again. done this so many times. don’t be an asshole.” 

“I’m sorry, sir, I’m not seeing any Snas-”

“sans.” He snaps, then groans. He has no idea if Asgore has just set this up to fuck with him, or if this is legitimately a new guardsman who didn’t know him. They all looked more or less indistinguishable under that armor. 

“Well. Mr. Sans. If you’ll just wait right here I’ll go and see if the king is accepting visitors.” The guardsman says, and Sans groans. He could just be in the throne room. All he needed to do was cut a damn door, and he’d be in the throne room, he could get this apologizing bullshit over with, and he could be back home with his fiance and a pool party and some kids, work on the “let’s teach Frisk magic” plan, anything but having to apologize to the royal kid-killer. 

Some things, you just didn’t let go, he thinks darkly. 

The entrance hall is familiar. Too familiar. Sometimes he thinks he’s spent a lifetime here, in this room, waiting for… something he can’t quite remember. Something sharp, and red, something reeking like flowers and candy and death, something small, something wrong. 

He fixes his eyes out the window, spies that sliver of sky, and he keeps his pupils locked on it, focusing on that cloudless blue. He breathes, his ribcage rising and falling to a deliberate tempo. 

He doesn’t want to be here.

“Mr. Sans.” He spins quickly at the noise. “The king will see you now. Do you know where you’re-”

“yeah. thanks.” He cuts the guard off and then, just to make the point that he’d been polite, that he didn’t need to be, he makes a shortcut, steps into nothing and nowhere, enjoying the quick, startled exclamation of the guard before it’s cut off as the doorway seals behind him. 

Asgore’s at his desk, as usual. He looks… weary. Exhausted, even. His record player is spinning, but it’s just playing the same few seconds of static over and over again. He doesn’t notice Sans. Well, of course. He’d expected Sans to use the door. Sans hesitates for a moment, then clears his throat. Asgore starts, slightly, then lifts his massive head from his papers, focusing on Sans. He doesn’t look mad, or sad, or irritated, or _anything._ He simply looks. 

“Sans.” He finally says, which is going to have to cut it for a greeting. 

“asgore.” Sans replies, then takes a breath. “look. i’m here because i said something horrible. i know i shouldn’t have. i know it was… look, i’m gonna be a dad now. i know how bad it was.” 

“No.” Asgore says, soft and quiet. “You don’t.” He stands up slowly, and walks around his desk, each footstep heavy on the stones until they give way to soft grass and meadow flowers. “You couldn’t know, until you’ve held them in your arms. Until they’ve called you ‘dad’ and hung off your horns. Until you’ve let them crawl into bed with you because they had a bad dream. Until you’ve watched them grow sicker and sicker until they fade entirely.” He says, low, with something half broken, half stern in his voice.

Sans looks up at him, clenching his teeth so tight it hurts, then he slowly inclines his head. Yes. He doesn’t know.   
“That said.” Asgore mutters, after a moment. “You were right. I should not have…” He hesitates, then suddenly, he rests a paw on Sans’ shoulder. Sans doesn’t flinch, though, god, he wants to. “Sit. Let us talk.” Asgore says, and without further ceremony, he sinks down to his haunches in the middle of the grass and flowers of the throne room. Sans blinks at him, and then, after a second, he complies. This is not how he imagined this would go. 

“I do not enjoy being a king.” Asgore says, after a long moment. “My father told me that the type of person who enjoys ruling is the type of person who should never hold this office. That is not to say that there aren’t great joys. The day we stepped forth from this place, my soul nearly burst with pride for my people. For Frisk. But… those days are infrequent, and to be treasured.” He locks eyes with Sans. “A king is a servant to his people. A true king, a good thing, knows that the needs of the many must, must always outweigh the needs of the few.” He says quietly.

Sans almost speaks up at that. He’s not… he’s not sure that he believes that. Some things are greater than the needs of the many. Some lines should never be crossed, even if it would save-

“A king must, on occasion, do terrible things.” Asgore says softly.

“asgore…” Sans begins, trying to find the right thing, something consoling, something convincing, something that would prove that this wasn’t just… weighing costs. 

“I should not have insinuated your child would be a problem.” Asgore interrupts whatever thought Sans had been trying to develop. “On occasion I am too much a king, too little a father, a husband, a person who exists outside of this office. A king knows that an unknown being, with unknown powers, is a threat. A man knows better. I know you. I know your… fiancee.” He says carefully. “I know you will raise the child with your values. But… some advice, to a new father. Be… _attentive_.” He says quietly. 

“hm?” Sans can see that Asgore is trying to get something across here, but he just can’t tell what. 

“Children. They’re their own people. They make their own decisions.” Asgore says, something soft and mournful in his tone. “Sometimes, they make the wrong ones. Be attentive.” He repeats, and looks at Sans, until Sans swallows and nods. 

“got it.” He says quietly. “i’ll pay real close attention.” The king looks at him for another long moment, making sure this sinks in, then nods once more, and rises from his spot, groaning. 

“These bones are too old.” He complains, and then, almost ridiculously, offers Sans a hand up. Sans can’t believe it. He can’t wrap his mind around what had just happened. He’d come here to apologize for rubbing Asgore’s nose in the fact that his kids had died, and he’d just gotten a mild lecture on parenting and… governing?

“uh, thanks.” He says, trying not to look too shocked. 

“Thank you for coming and speaking with me. A lesser man might not have.” Asgore says, his eyebrows raising almost imperceptibly. 

“wellll… i did get nudged out the door.” Sans admits. Asgore pauses, then lets out a booming laugh. 

“I suspected as much. And I suspect more than an earful when I next hear from my wife. It is good that we have them.” He says, and then, more guiltily, mutters, “Golly, she’s going to have my hide.” 

That last bit, Sans gathers, is Asgore the man, not Asgore the king.

“i uh, got a pretty good talkin’ to, too.” He assures Asgore, then, trying to fortify the goodwill that’s going on, adds, “uh. look. thanks for understanding. my kid… i just…”

“I know.” Asgore says quietly, and even though he’d given Sans that whole lecture about how Sans couldn’t possibly understand the harm from what he’d said, Sans knows that Asgore isn’t lying. Asgore knows. 

“well. thanks. i’d, uh… better be getting home. ________’s got tori and frisk and all their little friends over for a pool party, i think. uh… you’re welcome to come…” He begins, not sure if he really means it. Asgore sighs. 

“I would love to spend the time with my family, but I must review our security plans today. Particularly with the slow release of so many of the humans who organized the last attack.” He sighs. “Go on. Have fun.” 

And that’s it then, Sans thinks. Somehow, amazingly, he was getting away with only a slap on the wrist for saying one of the most awful things a person could possibly say to a man. Amazing. Maybe you were right. Maybe he could solve more problems just by talking through them, instead of slamming people against the wall with enough blue magic to tear this damn palace down. Subtlety. 

“ok. seeya-”

“Actually, if you wouldn’t mind waiting for… just a moment.” Asgore suddenly interrupts. “I suppose I do have some news that it would likely be preferable to hear about firsthand.” 

Aha. The other shoe drops. 

Nobody gets away with blaming a king for the death of his kids.   
Asgore paces to the door, and grabs the attention of one of the Royal Guards. They engage in a quick, quiet conversation, and then Asgore walks back in. 

“Just a moment.” He says lightly, and then notices, at last, the record player stuttering over a few seconds of quiet. “Oh, goodness.” He says, and walks over to replace the needle. It’s a band that he thinks he’s heard you play before, that’s in that huge crate of your dad’s records that you put on every now and then. He doesn’t know the name, but he knows the song, peppy, upbeat, cheerful. “Wouldn’t It Be Nice?” the singer asks.

Something instinctual, something dark and suspicious and worried, figures out what the king must be making him wait for, just a second or two before it actually arrives. 

Of course. Of fucking course. It was obvious. The king had only one thing capable of tormenting him with, and he’d poked the goddamn bear just enough. 

“S-son.” He hears the voice from behind him, and for a second, he considers not turning around, just stepping out of this place, going home, grabbing you, going somewhere _safe_.

“dad.” He sighs, then turns. “ah.” He hasn’t seen his father in a lab coat in so goddamn long, but, of course, this is to be expected. He should have seen all of this coming. Improbably, a line from that damn musical about the rapping Founding Fathers (that Capra would just _not_ stop fucking putting on the stereo!) plays in his head. Every action has an equal opposite reaction. 

“The thing is, Sans,” Asgore begins, and he is pretending to be apologetic, he’s got the right posture, the right tone of voice, but that look in his eye is cold and hard and satisfied, “The humans, they do still pose a threat. Your fiancee, my child, they surely aren’t the only ones. Others are almost certainly out there. They nearly destroyed us last time. We need to be ready. We need someone who’s seen…. more of what they could be capable of.” He inclines his head at Gaster, who nods graciously back. 

“so. turns out the penalty for tryin’ to kill me and ________ was, uh, three months of solitary? was it even that long?” He barks out, then he can’t help himself, he lets out a laugh that is not exactly the sanest.

“Of course not-t-t. I am still constrained to the palace. I am still under guard-d-d-d-d.” Gaster almost gets stuck at that last word, but he manages to wrench himself out of the clicking tic. “I am simply making my skills useful. For the good of our people.” He says, though… Sans knows him well enough, of course, to tell the difference on a skull that lacked nearly all expression (he wasn’t meant to be a skeleton, he’d been something else once, he knew that, he forgot it sometimes but in a practical sense he knew it) between a smile and a neutral expression. Gaster is… 

Oh, Gaster is pleased with himself. 

“right. ‘course. kickass.” He mutters, and Asgore nods at him again. 

“I am sorry, Sans. Some things must be done, though. For the protection of us all.” He says softly.

A king is not spiteful, or prideful, or furious. A king acts for the good of his people. 

A man gets revenge.

“yeah.” Sans says, and before he can lose his composure, before he can scream, before he can commit regicide, he cuts a doorway home, nods at both of them, and then takes a step, then another.

Fuck.


	118. Wherein Mettaton Goes All Freddie Mercury on Your Ass

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [i ran out of creepy things coaches say but here's the link to my tumblr](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted: even f.artier](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> And great news, because tonight is the rarest of events, that sweet sweet Two Stream Night! We'll be starting out with [ TST Plays Skyrim while OnaDacora does the jokes! ](https://www.twitch.tv/totalskeletontrash) AND THEN, when our Wrexie returns from the war, we'll be moving over to [Wrexie draws stuff!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington) feat: TST and Ona.
> 
> Truly, a night of adventures. Day. Whatever. 
> 
> I hope to see some of you later as I rim the goddamn sky. Here's a chapter.

A goddamn, motherfucking, fucking… fuck… shitfuck… a date. He’d agreed to a goddamn date. 

Okay. So, it had been one thing when it was the middle of the night, when he was all hopped up on that neurochemical con job that happened after sex, when Threep was looking so (cute, happy, perfect-) hot. Whatever.

But now it was an hour before he was supposed to be going out, and he was…

Fuck. Shitfuck. Was that even a word?

He was _nervous_. 

This was horribly embarrassing, of course. It wasn’t like he’d never been on a date before. On the contrary. He’d been on thousands of first dates, surely, hundreds of second dates, a couple dozen third dates, maybe a few beyond that. But this was… different.

This had all happened backwards. He should have just asked the goddamn robot out before Sans’ asshole dad had decided to throw him across the goddamn cavern, _goddamn!_ They would have gone home, to _his_ home, gotten off, end of story. But… that’s not how things had happened, of course, and now everything meant something and he was spending every night with this man and it was _stupid_ -

“hey-”

“Jesus, can you not!” He snaps, as Sans walks through a doorway from nowhere into the kitchen and immediately begins speaking. Sans stares at him for a second, and Capra, seeing the look on his face, winces. “Sorry, bud. What’s wrong?”

Sans hesitates, the lights in his eyes small and distant. He’s thinking about something, and even with that upset look on his face, Capra is fascinated. Sans’ mind doesn’t work like anyone else’s, and when he’s processing something, god, what he wouldn’t give to understand how Sans got from point A to point B. Finally, the skeleton speaks. 

“look. you should know, i suppose. probably one of the first who should know. the king, uh, let gaster out of his cell-”

“The fuck?!” Capra sputters, horrified.

“right?!” Sans replies immediately, looking a little happier now that his anger is vindicated, and Capra can tell now that Sans is _furious_. Good. Furious people got shit done sometimes. “look. he’s supposed to be under lockdown at the palace still, like, he’s grounded.” Capra’s eyes widen. 

“Right. Because he was such a bad boy. He _killed a human_ , Sans.” A startled look crosses Sans’ face, and then he winces and nods. 

“uh. yeah. suppose he did. suppose paula counted as a human. he also did his best to kill you, bud.” 

“I’m very aware. Shit.” He says, feeling that phantom pain all over again. He was healed so, so much faster than he should have been, but Toriel hadn’t been able to warn him, hadn’t known, that his body might be better, but that the human brain didn’t adapt quite as quickly to magical healing, that he still felt shaky on his legs, that he instinctively curled to protect ribs that were fine now, that sometimes, when he woke up, for a heartbeat or longer, he was only seeing out of the one eye… Okay. No need to feel sorry for yourself, Peter. You could have been the one who had died on top of the lava. 

People didn’t sink, when they were thrown into lava, it turned out that was a movie thing. It was too dense. You stayed on the top and you burned. 

He shakes his head, focusing again. “Okay. Well. What are we gonna do, bud? What do you need from me? We’ve got a lot of people to keep safe. You got a plan?” He says, and Sans looks at him for another second, then says, sounding different than he’s ever heard his friend talk,

“you, uh… you’re slippin’, pete. nobody’s gonna believe you’re really a selfish ass if you keep this up. fair warning.”  
Oh goddamn it. 

“Don’t be like that.” Capra protests immediately, running his hand through his hair, then winces. “Shit! No. Be like that if you want-”

“s’ok.” Sans looks sympathetic. “but uh… pal.”

“I know, I’m sorry, I know, shit-” Capra cringes, and Sans shakes his head.

“just, uh… you should be learning how to use that.” 

“No.” It’s like all the camaraderie, all the air, like everything is sucked out of the room by the finality of that ‘no.’ At least, that’s what Capra imagines. Sans winces, glancing down, but after a second, for whatever reason, he forges onwards. 

“look, bud. you can’t go through life worrying that you’re uh… you know. doin’ the thing, every time you slip up.” He says, hesitates, and then mutters, “and.”

Of course there’s an “and.” 

“And what?” Capra demands, the muscles in his jaw feeling tense.

“and. if gaster decides to pay us a house call, somehow. wouldn’t it be nice if someone could just tell him to stop?” Sans says pointedly. 

Oh.

His stomach twists uncomfortably. 

“I’ll… think about it.” He mutters quietly. Sans watches him, and after a second, he steps closer. 

“look, bud. i don’t wanna make you do anything you don’t want-”

“Hah.”

“ok. yeah. irony.” Sans realizes. “s’just that… like you said. got a lot of people to keep safe.”

Capra’s opening his mouth, not entirely sure what he’s going to say, when you come in the sliding glass door, wrapped in a towel and smiling at the sight of Sans. He moves to your side at once, of course. He always does. Capra thinks that’s kind of nice.

“Hey babe! I didn’t realize you were already home.” You greet him. “Uh, so, funny thing, all the kids went down to the beach because the pool got too cold because… you know, because Frisk randomly made a giant iceberg out of nowhere? Paps and Undyne and Cody are trying to clean it up. I told them just to let it melt, but…” Sans winces again.

“they uh, hangin’ out with an ice cap?”

“Uh, yeah.” You say, but you’ve noticed the look on his face. “What’s the matter?”

As Sans tells you, wrapping an arm protectively around you as he does so, Capra’s stomach twists uncomfortably. He could help. Sans had said it himself. He could be useful here. 

But. 

Here was the thing about something like that. He’d seen things like this before. Men and women who compromised. They became the CEO, the majority shareholder, the Lieutenant Governor, they said it wouldn’t let it get to their head, and next thing you know it’s all strippers and blow and everyone’s bankrupt. Power was a tricky thing. And _his_ power was…

“Peter, are you ready to - oh.” Mettaton walks into the kitchen, taking in the unhappy looks on everyone’s faces. “Oh, dear. What’s wrong?”

Again, the recitation. Mettaton’s fuming by the end of it, of course, and he’s made his way to Capra’s side, looking nearly as furious as you and Sans.

“Well. I’m going to give our damn king a piece of my mind-”

“don’t push him.” Sans cautions. “at least gaster’s supposed to be under guard.” 

“I know those guards.” Mettaton says archly. “He might as well be wandering around the surface skipping through a field of daisies.” Capra snorts out an unattractive laugh at that, and Mettaton gives him a quick smile, then grimaces.”Oh, dear, I forgot. Peter, we have to go or we’ll miss our reservations.”

“Oh. You still wanna-” He begins, surprised. He’d imagined that was cancelled now, sacrificed to the usual ‘can we shore up the defenses any more?’ conversation that usually happened when shit went fucky.

“Yes.” Mettaton says firmly. “I do. We shouldn’t live in fear just because the king is being an ass. Besides.” He looks at you. “As far as we know, he still has no magic, yes?”

“As far as we know.” You confirm. Sans sighs, lost in thought again, Capra’s sure. 

“Uh. Okay, then. We should, uh. Go.” Damn, he’d forgotten he was nervous and now it was back. Sans notices, of course, a small smile crossing his face that isn’t exactly kind.  
“where you guys goin’?” He asks, pretending to sound lazy and unconcerned. Capra knows the difference at this point. He’s interested, if only so that he could tease Capra later. 

“The Tidepool for dinner, darling, and then we’re going to a wonderful little karaoke bar my cousin told me about. I don’t believe Peter’s ever seen me perform, so it should be fun!”

“Uh. Yup.” Capra confirms, his stomach twisting again. He isn’t sure that he really enjoys loud, showy Mettaton, but… he knew that it was just an act. And it would make him happy, so…

“you sure, cap? you’re lookin’ kinda seasick.” Sans grins, and then inches away from you when you elbow him. Thanks for that, but it’s too late, Sans has made his little joke and now Mettaton is looking at him all funny. 

“Yup.” He repeats again, stubborn as all hell. Fuck you, Sans. Mettaton gives him a quick smile, brushing a piece of hair back into place on his forehead, and then, god, he cuts him a break. 

“You should all come to karaoke, darlings. Wouldn’t it be fun?” He asks lightly. Oh, thank christ, he’s taking the pressure off. “Something like a triple date, if Alphys and Undyne want to attend? Oh, and of course Papyrus.” 

“oh, we wouldn’t want to intrude.” 

Sans, you shit. 

“It wouldn’t be intruding at all, dearest.” Mettaton replies, all sweet and innocent. Capra is so, SO aware that he’s doing this just for him, and in that second, he’s able to recognize just how much he likes this guy. Just for a second, though. 

You’re glaring at Sans. “Thanks, Mettaton. That sounds really fun. We’ll meet you there later tonight? Is it cool if we bring a human too, we’ve got one hanging out by the pool right now and I don’t want to-”

“Of course.” Mettaton says warmly, looking at you with true gratitude. “The more the merrier!” 

“heh. k. we’ll see you later. have fun on your _date_ , guys.” Sans smirks, and, so that Capra doesn’t kill him, he just grabs Mettaton’s hand, says, 

“Okay we gotta go see you later bye,”

And he makes a goddamn break for it. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------

“Okay, but you didn’t need to be a dick about it, Sans.” You remind him, several hours later. You’re all at the karaoke bar; you, Sans, Undyne and Alphys, Papyrus and a slightly bewildered looking Cody. You’re tired - a full day of running around with the kids (and Spot, who’d drifted out to splash in the water at the beach, where she was allowed), cooking burgers and ‘dogs, getting scolded for not wearing enough sunscreen by an already on-edge fiance… you might not have gone out tonight, if it weren’t for the fact that it looked like Capra was shitting himself at the idea of several long hours of uninterrupted date time. So here you all were, except, well, Capra and Mettaton, who still hadn’t arrived. 

“i wasn’t a dick!” He argues, indignant. You raise your eyebrows and take a sip of seltzer, trying not to grimace at the off key rendition of “Werewolves of London” that’s happening right now on the karaoke stage. Sans hesitates, then sighs. “i was kinda a dick. he just makes it so easy.”

“I know.” You console him, kissing the side of his head. He chuckles, and you watch Cody nudging Undyne, muttering, 

“So, we’re literally waiting for _the_ Mettaton? And a CEO? And, uh, this is normal for you dudes?!” 

Poor Cody. 

Just then, the missing two members of your party arrive, both looking rather… well, happy.

“Hey, boys!” You call, grinning. Capra spots you first and nudges Mettaton, still grinning about some private joke, and the two of them wander over, sliding into the two empty seats you’d been fighting strangers from stealing all night. “You have a good time?”

“Hey! Hell yeah!” Capra exclaims, speaking loudly over the music. “The waiter looked down his nose at Threep and started acting like a monster couldn’t understand wines, so we Pretty Woman-ed him!”

“Uh, what?” Undyne needs to know. 

“IT’S A MOVIE WHERE A HUMAN WITH A BIG MOUTH DISCOVERS THAT SHE’S A PRETTY WOMAN!” Papyrus begins to explain, which makes Sans snicker. Oh, it’s good to see him laugh. He’s so tense about the Gaster thing. Well, so are you. But Mettaton’s right. You can’t just hide forever. 

“Uh, okay, bro, but I think there’s more to the movie than-” Cody begins, and you’re wondering if you could even begin to fathom what Capra would mean by ‘Pretty Woman-ing’ a waiter, when the MC gets on the microphone and announces, 

“Ladies and Gentlemen, word’s got around that we have a real celebrity in our midst!”

Mettaton looks like Christmas just came early, smiling even wider. Capra gives him an amused grin as the MC continues;

“Now, I know he just got here, but I wonder if he might do us a favor by singing us something tonight? What do you say, folks, do you want to hear Mettaton sing?”

The bar erupts. 

“That’s your cue.” Capra smirks. Mettaton beams, then says, 

“Do you mind terribly?”

“No! Go on, you’re gonna kick ass.” Capra laughs, waving down a waitress for a drink. Mettaton beams, kisses his cheek quickly, and then seems to slip into his performance mode, standing up and taking each step with the sort of practice of someone who’s spent a lot of time being adored by audiences. He strolls up to the stage (to deafening cheers and applause), and leans over to murmur something to the MC, who gives him a quick thumbs up.

A few moments later, Mettaton begins to sing the first notes of “Don’t Stop Me Now,” coming in _exactly_ at the right time as the backing track starts. Again, the bar goes absolutely wild, but they quiet down a little as he keeps singing.

He is just _crushing_ it.

Well, of course he is. You’d watched him perform on TV a dozen times before you’d even met him. You owned his CD. Of course Mettaton was going to nail it. Still, there’s something awesome about being in such a small venue, watching him perform (which he clearly loves to do), the energy in the room so excited. You’re grinning to yourself when Sans nudges you with his elbow. You look over at him, and he nods just a little at Capra, getting your attention to move to the other man. 

Capra’s mouth is slightly open. He looks absolutely astonished. Right, Mettaton had said that Capra had never seen him perform.

“He’s awesome, huh?” You ask him.

“Holy shit.” Capra mutters, not looking over at you, unable to tear his eyes from the stage. 

“You hear him sing before?”

“No. Holy shit.” He repeats, a disbelieving smile slowly crossing his face.  
When the last notes play, Capra’s the first on his feet, clapping and cheering. Well, the whole bar is. Mettaton was spectacular, after all, and the place is going absolutely insane. It takes several minutes for the cheering to end enough for the MC to thank him and the bar to fall a little quieter again. Mettaton’s walking down the stage steps, when one table, near the stage, begins to chant. 

For a moment, you think it’s just another cheer, but then you make out the words; six or seven men and women are staring at Mettaton, slowly raising the volume of their voices as they chant:

“BACK. WHERE. THEY. BELONG.”

The smile on Mettaton’s face drops instantly, and the rest of the room is deathly silent for a moment, save for the chanting table, as dozens of people all struggle, all at once, to figure out what they should be doing. You feel similarly paralyzed. It’s like time is moving in slow motion; you see the anger on Undyne’s face, the open horror on Cody’s, the hurt in Papyrus’ eyes, feel Sans gripping your hand (reassuring you? reminding you not to throw a spear?), and you feel like you should be doing _something_! Somebody should be doing something, at the very least?

“Stop. Talking.” 

Oh. 

Somebody’s doing something.

You hadn’t noticed Capra standing up or moving, but he’s there on the other side of the chanting table now, and in the silence that follows as the table falls quiet, the chant dying on their lips, you could hear a pin drop, if some idiot had chosen that moment to drop a pin.

“You don’t talk that way to my boyfriend ever again.” Capra says, soft and dark. “You don’t talk that way to any monsters, ever again. Go home. Think about how shitty you all are.” 

There’s a long moment where it seems like nothing happens, and then, as voices of agreement with Capra’s statement erupt around the room, one by one, the table of assholes gets to their feet, and quickly exits the bar. Some of them even have the good grace to look ashamed as they do so.

Then again. They kind of had to. 

The bar is loud again, first with jeers, then with applause and cheers as the last of them go through the doors. People are coming around to apologize to Mettaton personally, but he waves them off, navigating around the table to the still furious looking Capra. He murmurs something in the other man’s ear, places his hand on his back, and the two of them return to your table as the MC weakly tries to recover, and soft music fills the bar once more - it’ll probably be a while before anyone else wants to get up on that stage. 

“Peter.” Mettaton says quietly. “I could have handled it, I’ve done it before, you didn’t have to do that-” 

“Yes,” Capra cuts him off, equally quietly, “I did.” 

(“Um, what just-” Cody begins, but Undyne elbows him. She’s looking at Capra and Mettaton with big, adoring eyes. So is Alphys, actually. You know those looks. They’ve just found a new OTP.)

Sans nods once, appovingly, but neither of them notice; they’re busy looking at each other with very serious, very focused expressions on their faces. Finally Mettaton speaks up. 

“‘Boyfriend?’” He mutters. The briefest flicker of something that isn’t steely determination crosses Capra’s face, but then his jaw tenses and he nods. 

“You cool with that?” 

Well, judging from the kiss Mettaton gives him, that’s probably a yes.


	119. Wherein You Bang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, chapters for the next week or two might be erratic because i'm moving. So!
> 
> [come to my tumblr, where if you choose you can support my brokeass in the middle of a move](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)

After that particular bomb had been dropped, the rest of the night at the karaoke bar goes off smoothly. Okay, maybe not perfectly. After the cheerful mood in the bar picks back up, Capra looks a little queasy - you’re not sure if it’s because he’d used his power, which he’d pledged never to do, or because he’d just committed himself to a relationship, which you’re pretty sure he’d…. also pledged never to do. After a few drinks, though, he’s relaxed enough to drape his arm around the back of Mettaton’s chair and wrangle his usual sarcastic, slightly amused look back on his face. 

Except when Mettaton gets up to sing again, of course (and he does that several times). Then Capra just looks increasingly… is “smug” the right word? It’s probably not entirely fair to him. 

But yeah. Smug. 

It’s a fun time, though, even though your seltzer begins to taste more and more bland as the rest of your group (and, you know, the entire bar) grow rowdier and begin to laugh harder and harder. Well, Papyrus isn’t drinking either, but that doesn’t mean anything - Paps is always cranked up to ten, and so the duet he screams out with Undyne is… 

It’s something.   
You’re coaxed up for a song by Alphys, who is too shy to sing alone - though you’re not sure if that shyness is faked when you end up singing “The Internet is For Porn” from Avenue Q with her. Sans is cracking up, of course - you can see him brush a tear of laughter from his eyesocket, the little jerk. He nudges you when you sit back down, blushing at the raucous cheers (and comments from the scattered monsters in the crowd who had certainly noticed the increasingly evident Dot).

“you wanna go home?” He’s raising his eyebrows just enough to be suggestive. You glare at him. 

“You’re just trying to get out of singing.” You accuse, and he laughs. 

“too lazy to make an ass of myself up there. c’mon. lessgo. they won’t miss us.” He nods at the table, and it’s true, your friends are all preoccupied, either with each other, or with the scene Cody’s making as he belts out “Sexyback.”

“be nice to have the house to ourself for a while.” He says, his browbones raising a millimeter higher. You snicker, and nudge his shoulder. 

“Fine, fine.” You agree, and make a game attempt of telling everyone that you’re leaving, or at least trying to get someone’s attention - Cody’s loud! Your table, to be fair, is also loud. You finally thwap Undyne on the shoulder and make a gesture to show her that you’re splitting. She blinks, nods, and then immediately looks back on stage, letting out a whoop. You shrug mentally. You tried. Taking Sans’ hand, the two of you cut through the crowded bar and, once you’re outside, take a quick shortcut home, landing (as you’ve grown accustomed to doing) in the kitchen. 

Sans smirks at you as you shut the door, his eyes darting to the kitchen table for a second, and you snicker at him. He’s leaning in for a kiss when you hear a bump at the sliding glass door and a whining trill in your head simultaneously. 

“Oh. Shit! We left Spot outside.” You say, distracted, looking at your (awfully pathetic looking) Blaster through the sliding glass door. 

“she’s used to the void. she’s fine.” Sans argues halfheartedly, not really wanting to be distracted from his goal right now. 

“Sans. Poor girl thinks we just ditched her.” 

“we kinda did.” He says, and you sigh. 

“C’mon. Let’s take her for a walk first. Poor sweetie.” He pouts at you for a second, but then looks outside at Spot, and beyond her, the night sky.   
“s’pose it is a nice night.” He admits, and then grins, kisses you anyway (that way that always makes your knees weak), and then sidles to the door. 

It’s a nice night. The air has cooled down a little, the stars are bright, and you’ve got Sans and Spot by your side. What else do you possibly need to be happy? Swinging Sans’ hand in yours a little, the three of you make your way across the back lawn and down to the beach. No sobbing CEOs this time, just the sound of waves, the feeling of sand beneath your feet. Sans nudges your shoulder with his own. 

“that dune. ‘s where we had our first date.” He remarks. It’s your turn to raise your eyebrows. 

“That was a date?” You say dryly. “The way I remember it, you popped up out of nowhere and scolded me for not being inside.” 

“well, you wandered off!” He laughs, tugging your hand to make you plop down next to him on the same sand dune. Spot eyes you for a moment, lets out a huff, and then drifts down to the water to snap her jaws at the waves. She’s having fun, so you don’t feel terribly guilty leaning in next to Sans and letting him nuzzle your neck. “‘sides.” He says, after a moment. “you still slept with me that night.”

“Um, slept with you in the most literal sense!” You laugh, poking his ribs. 

“fallin’ asleep next to someone; technically, sleeping with them.” He says lazily, that obnoxious smile on his face. God, you love this idiot. 

“Sure, you tell yourself that, stud.” You tease, then sigh, resting your head on his shoulder. It’s soft, not just hard bones. He always does that for you without you ever asking; he’s always trying to anticipate what you need. You stay there like that for a while, you watching Spot playing in the waves, him, as usual, watching the sky. You wonder what’s going on in his head right now. He’s been acting so cheerful tonight, but… well, you know he can’t be happy, because Gaster’s out of his cell, and you suspect he’s forcing his good cheer. You’re thinking of saying something when he lets out a content sounding sigh, and rests his head atop yours. 

Okay. Maybe not. Maybe he just needs this. 

“I think she’s tired out.” You murmur, after a while. Spot’s game with herself has grown lethargic, and she only halfheartedly splashes when the next wave comes. “Let’s go back inside, baby.” 

“mm, k.” He sounds a little sleepy too. “time is it?” You glance at your phone. 

“After midnight.” 

“what? really?” He says, sounding surprised. “we’ve been out here for… was it really that long?”

“Guess so.” You say, stretching and then standing. He’s lost in thought for a moment, but then he takes your hand and staggers to his feet, turning around. 

“ugh. lights are on. think they’re home now.” He pouts. You have to giggle at that.   
“Sorry, baby. You’ll just have to bone me in our bedroom like usual.” You say consolingly. He makes a show of pouting for another long moment, and then he grins, takes your hand, and tugs you through a doorway and into your room. 

\-----------------------------------------

You wake up the next morning with the sinking feeling that something’s wrong. 

Sans is wrapped around you - you’d kicked the covers off sometime last night, but Sans never seemed to get too hot to hold you at night, and last night, he’d been particularly clingy in his sleep. Still, you feel the steady rise and fall of his ribs against your back and you know he’s okay, and when you glance down at your stomach, already beginning to panic - god, you hadn’t hurt the baby last night, right, that was just a stupid thing kids thought before they took sex ed, pregnant ladies had sex all the time! - no, no, thank god, the Dot was brighter than ever. So what… why were you feeling so…

Oh. 

“Sans. Wake up.” You say quietly. 

“nnnh?” An arm tightens around your waist. 

“I’m out of magic. Again.” You tell him. 

He wakes up at that, peeling away from you and sitting up straight. 

“what? how?!” He says, then quickly adds, “the baby-”

“It’s fine. Look.” You say, and wait patiently until he’s satisfied that the flare that represents your baby’s soul is exactly where it should be.

“phew. but… what?” He says, after a moment. 

“I don’t know!” You say, feeling a little pathetic. You don’t _like_ it when your body does new things without telling you, and you definitely don’t like how it feels with only that black flicker of Gaster’s time magic, somewhere deep in your soul. Sans doesn’t like it either - his eyes sweep over you again, and you can see that he’s tense. 

“maybe i-” He begins, and you shake your head. 

“It’s not you. Whatever it is.” You sigh. “Maybe it’s the baby. I’m sure it takes a lot of energy, being made.”

“this doesn’t happen to monsters, though.” Sans says, looking down at the Dot once more. 

“Yeah. But I’m not a monster. This is… I know we say this a lot, but this is uncharted territory.” You remind him. 

“yeah. but…” You know he doesn’t want to think it, that he doesn’t like the idea that the baby might be hurting you. Which, well… he was going to have to get over, eventually, because making a baby was one thing that you weren’t gonna get out of pain-free. This, though;

“I’m fine, Sans. I just… don’t get it, but I’m fine.” You reassure him. He looks you over, like he thinks you might be lying, and then looks at your soul again. Or left boob. One of the two. 

“i don’t like this.” He mutters. 

“That makes two of us. Er. Three of us?” You say, glancing down once more. He cracks a smile at that, but you can see the conflicted look on his face even past that smile. “Okay, babe. Tell me what you’re thinking.” You demand. He sighs. 

“i’m thinkin’, uh, we should really try to figure out why this is happening.” Ugh. Of course. That meant another day standing under machines in the lab, almost certainly. “but.” Oh, thank god. There was a but. “i don’t like you not havin’ magic in the meantime.”

Standing under a machine for hours or morning sex?

Well, that was kind of an easy call. 

“Me neither. Wanna fix it?” You say, giving him a crooked grin. He snorts. 

“uh. last time i ‘fixed it’ we ended up with the dot.” Right. That’s… well, that’s definitely true. Maybe it really was a baby thing. Or…

Or, oh, shit.

“Last time you fixed it… Gaster was out of his cell then, too.” You say slowly, not wanting to alarm him too much. Like that’s even possible. His eyes widen, and then he grimaces. 

“fuck. you’re absolutely right. fuck, i _knew_ something was up last night, babe, we were outside for a while, sure, but do you remember hours going by? then this. something’s wrong. something’s messin’ with time. and we know one guy who, historically, does that.” He says, agitated. 

“...I mean. I do it too, now.” You remind him quietly. “And I did the pause even before Gaster lost his magic. Maybe it’s just… me. Or maybe it’s nothing. Maybe we stayed out on the beach for two hours last night because we’re mushy as all hell. Maybe I sleepmagicked. Maybe it’s the Dot.”

“maybe it’s my dad.” He says gruffly, then suddenly sighs. “babe, look, i’m sorry. you shouldn’t have to worry about this shit. and i know it’s my fault, at least a little-”

“Shut up, no it’s not!” You protest, then laugh at your rather childish immediate reaction. 

“well. i’m gonna go give him a piece of my goddamn mind. i am _done_ with having my family fucked with.” He says, and you can tell that he’s dead serious about that. 

“Not alone, you’re not.” You say at once. “I’m done with having the man I love get, um, fucked with too.” He narrows his eyes again, and you crack a small smile. “Besides. What if you need me to save your ass again?” Finally, he lets out a soft laugh at that. 

“well, you can’t save my ass without magic.” 

“I barely had any last time.” You point out, then shrug. “Or, you know. You could just fix it for me before we go.” Morning sex, no machines, probably a fiance in a better mood. Win win win. 

He looks at you for a long second, clearly thinking through all this, then finally, tiredly, he snickers. 

“...what most guys wouldn’t give to have problems like ours.” He points out, then double checks, “so. we’re gonna have sex and then go yell at my dad?” 

“...Yep.” You confirm. 

“pretty standard sunday.” He says, very, very sarcastically.

“I mean, look, we don’t gotta-”

“shh.” He cuts you off, then looks you over again, one last time, suddenly helpless. “i love you so much. i wish… it just seems kinda silly that this is the only way…”

“I know.” You sigh. “I mean, according to that Badbad book, I could drink your blood. Er. Do you have blood?” 

“gross. and the authorities are, uh, kinda out on that one.” He says, laughing again. “god. i really do love you, you know that? i feel like i’m taking advantage of this.” 

“Of course I know that. I love you too. And I also feel like I’m taking advantage of you.” You admit, leaning forward to kiss the side of his skull. Again, he laughs at that. 

“well. ‘s long as we’re both feelin’ guilty for no damn reason. let’s uh… fix your problem before we start a... uh, a… well. let’s fix your problem.” 

He probably could have picked a sexier way to say that, but then he kisses you, all love and worry, and bears you back down to bed, and for a while, you forget about trying to complete his sentence, before he cut himself off. 

You think it might have been “before we start a war.”


	120. Wherein You Remind Sans You've Seen His Dad Naked

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reminder that chapters for the next week or two might be erratic because i'm moving. 
> 
> [come to my tumblr, where if you choose you can support my brokeass in the middle of a move](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ We stream tonight, I'll be there soon!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

He doesn’t like _any_ of this. 

He’s thinking about dragging you upstairs to the lab, running some checks, something(!) but god, whatever your parents had been studying up there, it hadn’t been finetuned for “humans with magic.” 

Or humans with mystery hybrid babies growing inside them, for that matter. If he had to be technical. 

It had to be his dad. This was just… it was classic Gaster, right? It couldn’t be a coincidence that the guy was allowed out of his cell and just like, a few hours later time was feeling all sorts of wrong and you were missing your magic, and…

Still. He has to admit, if there was magic that Gaster wanted to… steal, somehow, wouldn’t it be that dark flicker of time magic lodged in the center of your soul? And that… that hadn’t budged. That was still stubbornly there. Was it as bright as it had always been? He wasn’t sure, and he hates that it’s because he was too squeamish about it to take proper measurements, to do his due diligence. It hadn’t been a scientist’s response. It had been the response of a man who just hated seeing something that wasn’t him, so close to your soul. It had been… foolish. 

Jealous?

“Hey.” You nudge him halfheartedly. He suspects that you don’t really want to do the plan anymore, that the last thing you want to do is to go and confront his dad, because you look sleepy and your soul is flaring bright and your magic is certainly back, you’ve traced a few random shortcuts in the air just to show him that you’re sure about that…

“hey.” He says, trying to look casual. 

“We should go.” You say, sounding disinterested in that prospect. He gets it. It would be so much more fun to just hold you for a while longer, to watch that Dot and marvel about how lucky the two of you were, that for once, you were the exceptions to the rule in a good way, a great way, that the two of you were allowed to have a kid when no other human/monster pairing had succeeded…

“yeah. you goin’ like that?” He teases, and you roll your eyes at him, biting back a grin. 

“Yeah, I thought maybe I would startle your dad into telling us what’s up. I mean, I suppose I’ve seen _him_ naked, so it’s only fair-” You say, your eyes sparking, and he snickers and hops up, offering you a hand. “Just lemme… gotta shower.” You yawn, accepting the help. “Fifteen minutes.” 

An hour or so later, you actually leave - he makes you eat some food and dry your hair and you get in a brief derailment as the two of you try to figure out if you’re allowed to drink coffee (it ends up being ‘yes, but not too much,’ and he has to stop and kiss you because of the relief on your face). But finally, after all that, there’s nothing left to distract either of you. Into the darkness of the underground you go. He cuts a quick doorway, and the two of you trade a glance, trepidation in your eyes. 

“we need this to stop happening to you.” He says. 

“It might not even be him doing it.” You remind him, your hand moving unconsciously to your stomach, fanning out over the Dot.   
“‘don’t trust him.’” He reminds you, and your eyes narrow for a moment, then you nod and step through. He has to scramble to follow - he doesn’t like feeling like he’s letting you walk into danger on your own. 

The royal guards stop you in the entrance hall, of course, just like last time. He’s ready to snap, to tell them that if they call him “Snas” again he’s going to be forced to slam them into every wall in the entire palace, but then you just walk up to them, smiling cheerfully, and ask if you might see Dr. Gaster, if it’s not too much trouble. The guards glance at each other for a second, and then one, sounding a little flustered, says, 

“Of course, Miss. Right away. And, er. Congratulations.” 

You turn around to look at him as if to say, ‘see? talking works!’ and he gives you an anxious smile, moving up to stand at your side. God, he hates this room. He hates that he has to keep _seeing_ the man who tried to kill you, that he has to keep fearing for your safety, that he has to keep waiting in this goddamn room…

“You okay?” You check quietly, taking his hand. He grimaces, then nods. 

“yeah. yeah, fine. ‘s just… dunno.” And well, that’s it. He doesn’t know. He has no idea why this place sets his teeth on edge, why he sees moving shapes out of the corners of his eyes, why he can still smell blood and nectar and candy and dust-

“Right this way, Miss. He’ll see you in his laboratory.” The guard returns with a clatter of armor, puffing slightly. This guy was supposed to keep Gaster from escaping? Sans doesn’t have a high opinion of his ability to pull that one off. 

“Laboratory.” You repeat, and again, your eyes narrow. “Well. Glad to see he’s really serving his time well.” The guard tilts his head at you, and Sans grits his teeth. 

“i know the way.” He says, cutting off any potential offer to escort you from the idiot in the armor. “c’mon, babe.” You look at him for a second, your mind clearly busy, but then you nod, squeezing his hand and letting him guide you down the hall, past the guard, and higher and higher, up endless flights of stairs, to the top of one of the towers. On each landing, another Royal Guardsman stands, watching the two of you silently as you continue to climb the spiral stairs. 

“How long has it been since-” You begin, still studying him, slightly out of breath, and he cuts you off, not really meaning to, but doing so anyway. 

“i was a kid, last time… well. he stopped spending time in the lab in the palace. built a new one in hotland. it was worse.” He says. That one, of course, he’d visited more recently. Much more recently than he’d like. “c’mon. think it’s only another flight or two.” 

It ends up being three - good, because if it were any more, he would have just risked startling his dad and cut a damn hole into the lab, prudence be damned. Instead, though, you both reach the top of the stairs, finding the door to the high tower room flung open, the soft hum of equipment purring busily away filtering out of the lab.

“don’t forget about your shoes. use that force field, if you need it.” He can’t keep the thought in. You glance at Sans, then squeeze his hand once more and step inside. 

It’s not _his_ lab, Sans thinks, protectively, but it’s… it’s always been impressive. Here, he knows what every machine does - or maybe “knew” is the operative term. There’s already new devices lining the walls, for purposes he simply can’t guess just from looking. His father isn’t busily tinkering away, however, which is most unusual. He’d never seen his father in this room and _not_ hard at work. He’s just standing on the far side of the room, staring out one of the windows, where… yes, there is a visible sliver of sky. 

Sans hates the rapturous expression on his father’s face. 

You clear your throat, and Gaster turns, looking startled for a second, then nodding. 

“Of course. Both-h of you.” He says. “The guard didn’t-t-t mention, but… well. Naturally it would be both of you.” He sounds a little put out, but he manages to find his footing after a second. “I should-d-d tell the both of you that coming here to scold an old man is pointless. I didn’t-t-t-t ask for my release. I was told. I am a s-s-s-servant of the king.” 

He can’t help it. He scoffs. Gaster meets his eyes, that same familiar scolding expression that’s always, always there on his face. 

“Believe what you choose, son.” He sighs, then turns his gaze to you. “How are you, my dear?” You stiffen next to him, and Sans knows you well enough to know what’s going through your head. That’s not the tone of someone who’s getting up to evil plots, right? That sounds like… well, like an old man. A doting grandfather. He squeezes your hand. 

Don’t trust him. 

“Uh. Not great, actually.” You begin. Gaster’s browbone moves minutely. 

“Oh, dear. Is the child-d… well, it certainly seems strong-g.” He says, and again, Sans feels that stab of irritation, seeing Gaster’s eyes dart down to check on the Dot. This is _his_ baby, and Gaster doesn’t _get_ to fuck with it, not like he had with him, not like he had with Paps-

“Look. I guess I’m just going to put this out there.” You sigh. “I kind of was hoping that you’d be attacking us, like, guns blazing? Because at least then, we’d know it was…” Oh, you always do have a way of putting things. He loves you for that, for the bewildered expression on his father’s face. “Are you trying to hurt me? Are you messing with my magic?” You ask. Gaster falls absolutely still, staring back at you. A long, silent moment passes. Sans is just about to snap, to be thoroughly and completely done with that moment, when Gaster clears his throat and speaks up again. 

“I am not-t-t.” He says softly. “I understand this must be hard to believe, but please do. I am not the half-mad man you found wandering the fourth dimension. I have no desire to be that-t man again. I would not harm you.” Suddenly, his eyes light up. “In fact. I have proof.” He looks up and nods at a corner of the lab. “There. And… there. Cameras.” He says quietly. Sans follows his gaze, instantly looking for blind spots. “And… well. T-this is rather humiliating, but…” Gaster clears his throat, and after a moment, he bends, lifting the hem of his pants to expose, bound tightly to his ankle, some sort of electronic device. 

Sans is bewildered, but you nod at once. “A tracking cuff. Like people on house arrest… oh.” You say, and Gaster gives you a patronizing nod. 

“Yes. I believe that the king got the idea f-from your human policing. I must admit, it is quite clever.” He mutters. “There should be several records of my movements at all times. Since the moment of my release from my cell. At the very least-t, those guards should be able to substantiate…” He trails off, looking between the two of you again. 

“i’m, uh, gonna wanna see that.” Sans hears himself saying, feeling suddenly foolish, feeling like a child who’s just been gently reprimanded. 

“Naturally.” Gaster says. “But-t… whatever is the matter? What is harming you, my dear?” You glance at Sans, then at Gaster, clearly thinking. Do you tell him? He grips your hand even tighter. Don’t trust him, don’t trust him, don’t-

“My magic keeps disappearing.” You say at last. “I mean, Sans’ magic. I mean-”

“Yes-s. I understand. Disappearing?” Gaster steps closer, looking truly interested now. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, the morning you and I had our Bill and Ted adventure … when we _time traveled_ ,” You clarify, when he simply looks confused, “It was because I woke up and my normal magic was gone. It happened again this morning. Just… gone. Any ideas?” 

“Hm.” Gaster says, his eyes bright now. Sans recognizes this face. It’s how Gaster looks when he’s presented with something new. Something interesting. “I wonder-r-r… and the babe? Did you-”

“Uh, I mean, technically we, um… conceived? Later that day?” Your voice sounds weak and your cheeks are red, but… 

“Interesting.” Gaster glances at Sans for a split second, looking… maybe amused is the term, that Sans had found it appropriate or necessary to, er, conceive a child on the same day his fiancee had been sucked through time. And then, well, he puts two and two together, realizes why that had been fully necessary to do - because you’d been without magic - and his eyesockets widen. “Well. I can’t say I’ve ever heard-d of something like that happening before.” He says, after a moment. “But. I can’t say I’ve heard of a human and a monster having a child-d either, and yet, here we all are.” 

“Great.” You sigh. “Well…” He doesn’t know what to do or say right now. Gaster has a light in his eyes, though, that he knows he doesn’t like. 

“Well, son, I’m glad-d-d you brought her to speak to me-”

“Hey, excuse me? I brought myself.” You interject immediately, and he grins, suddenly feeling more sure of himself. 

“Right. Of course. My ap-p-p-pologies.” Gaster placates you at once. “In any event. This is something we should be looking into. For your babe’s safety, as well as your own.” He says softly. You hesitate, and then restrain yourself from asking a question. Sans doesn’t. 

“dad. you see this happenin’ in any of those other timelines, back when you were playin’ god?” Gaster winces, then shakes his head. 

“Indeed I did not.” He says quietly. “Something… many things are entirely new, thanks in no small part to my coming unstuck from time. This… concerns me, however. ________, have you put any thought into who will help you as the child-d develops? If any human doctors will be equipped to deal with this…. unique situation?” So. Gaster’s either lying through his ass, or he thinks that the Dot has something to do with all of this. Sans doesn’t know what to think. 

“I’ll figure something out.” You say at once, and again, Gaster winces. 

“I f-fear that you may not have as many options as you might hope for.” He mutters. “I will prepare-”

“buddy, you ain’t doin’ shit-”

“Sans. Do you really w-wish to put your mate and child’s lives at risk-k-k because of some childish resentment-”

“Childish? You tried to kill both of us a few months ago!” You leap, at once, to his defense. 

“And _now I am trying to redeem myself!_ ” Gaster exclaims, sounding bitter and weary and worried and… old. His shoulders slump, after a moment. When he speaks up again, he just sounds exhausted. “I will… b-begin to acquire equipment. To study any old texts, to see if there is a-anything you might expect, any indication this may have happened before to any other human or monster. R-r-r. Should you need it, I will make this all available to you. At any time. I am at-t-t your disposal. I wish only to… assist. However I can.” 

Don’t trust him. 

“well, bud, first thing i’m gonna need is that surveillance footage. and that data from your little electronic leash.” Sans demands, cold and stubborn. He feels your eyes on him, and then you nod once. 

“Of course.” Gaster says, and takes a deep breath. For a moment, he hesitates, and then he looks out the window one last time, his eyes fixed on the sky. Then he nods, and turns back to the two of you. “Let us find the King.”


	121. Wherein You And Asgore Pick Out A Wedding Venue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I'm literally copying and pasting monday's)  
> eminder that chapters for the next week or two might be erratic because i'm moving. 
> 
> [come to my tumblr, where if you choose you can support my brokeass in the middle of a move](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> [ We stream tonight, I'll be there soon!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Right sure. We’ll just go find the king. The dude who had a bone to pick with your unborn child. The dude who’d let Gaster out, entirely out of spite. Let’s go hang out with him. Have some tea. Listen to the Beatles. 

Okay. You were a little grumpy.

It was just that, well, it really, genuinely, truly, annoying to discover that Gaster’s immediate reaction upon hearing about the issue with your magic had been… well… 

The reaction of a man who’d had absolutely nothing to do with it. 

Worse… damn it, he was right. Who was going to be able to help you with this? Who was possibly going to be prepared to help you with your pregnancy when nobody had any idea what was even coming? He seemed… genuine, in his offer for help. But. He’d seemed pretty damn genuine when he was trying to kill you too, and that had just been three months ago. 

Aw, jeez. Why was it that everything you did ended up being an international, interspecies issue? Couldn’t you just have a kid like everyone else? Couldn’t you just be normal?

Sans seems to sense your distress as the three of you make your ways through the halls. He squeezes your hand again, bone on bone. 

“you good?” He mutters, his eyes not leaving his father. You take a breath, then grit your teeth. 

“I’m good.” You confirm, grimacing as the three of you spill into the throne room. Asgore is there, speaking quietly with a wizened turtle monster, a book open in front of the two of them as they consult something. His huge head swings up as you walk in, and for an instant, he looks worried. Then he meets your eyes, then _flick_ , the usual glance down to check on whoever it is you’re currently gestating. Oh, god, that’s irritating.

He stares for what feels like a long, long time. When he looks back up, there’s something uncomfortable on his face. Is that guilt, maybe? Well. Now is a hell of a time to start feeling guilty, after he’d already let the cat out of the bag. Where the cat was your father-in-law who’d tried to kill you.

“Well. Looks like you’ve got a conversation that needs having. I’ll get out of your hair.” The turtle chuckles, and strolls through one of the side doors, deeper into the palace. You blink at that only for a second, before Asgore speaks up. 

“Er. Good afternoon. I was not expecting…”

“Y-y-your Majesty.” Gaster is formal in tone, and he looks rather respectfully up at the king as he approaches his desk. “It s-sss-s-”

“seems like we got a problem.” Sans cuts off his dad, walking forward as well. You have no option but to approach the king with him holding your hand the way he is, but … ugh, something in you just recoils with each step you take. This is a man that means ill towards the Dot. This is not someone you should be getting closer to right? 

Oh, weird. Is this some maternal instinct shit? You don’t know if you can handle that already. If someone says ‘mama bear’ at you, basically ever, you might be forced to lose your damn mind. 

“My d-daughter-in-law-”

“not yet.” Sans interjects, giving Asgore, then Gaster, absolutely irritated looks.

“Fine. _______. T-there seems to b-b-be an issue with her magic. It’s been g-going missing.” Gaster begins. Asgore’s eyebrows lift slightly. 

“Oh. Well, I am very sorry to hear that, but-”

“‘s happened twice. both times, this guy’s been out of his c-c-c-cell.” Sans mocks, his eyesockets narrowing. Gaster looks to the heavens in annoyance. “he says he should been on camera and, uh, i don’t know what you got goin’ on with his ankle there, a gaster positioning service or something. but i need to see it.” Asgore blinks at you, then looks between Sans and Gaster.  
“Er. Yes. Certainly. I suppose that we built in those safeguards… well, I did not expect to use them so soon… this may take a while.” 

“i got time.” Sans scoffs, and Asgore nods. 

“This way, then.” He stands up slowly, and leads the way across the field of flowers and grass in the throne room, to a door almost entirely obscured by hanging ivy - the leaves shrink away when he reaches for it, revealing a small room labeled “Security.” Okay. Makes sense. 

“So, I hear that your brother does the gardening here.” Gaster attempts, looking at Sans. “H-he does a very impressive job! Could you tell him… or actually, now that-t-t I have less restrictions in the palace, I suppose I could tell him myself-”

“buddy, if i ever hear you said a single fucking word to him…” Sans begins, his voice as dangerous as you’ve ever, ever heard it. 

“Er. These monitors show all the cameras.” Asgore interjects, clearing his throat. “And this display shows Dr. Gaster’s movements.” He nods at a wall covered in monitors, all displaying multiple feeds of information. 

“gotcha.” Sans plops down in a chair - there’s so little room in here that everyone else has to stand, sitting isn’t even an option. The king is even ducking his head to fit in the small security booth. Sans doesn’t seem to care, other than giving you a quick glance to make sure you’re alright. As he begins to feed backwards through the past day’s worth of data, pausing frequently to make sure what he’s seeing on the screen matches up with the string of numbers that represents the ankle monitor data - he seems to instantly understand that, somehow - you realize that, yes, this is going to take quite a while. And it’s hot in here!

“Babe, are you good? I’m going to go get some fresher air.” You ask, after a long uncomfortable silence. He glances up, seemingly unhappy about the prospect, but then takes in, for the first time, just how hot and close the room really is, especially with the king taking up a good half of it. 

“sure. i’m fine. i’m right in here if you need help.” He says slowly, pointedly. “not that you should. or you could just call spot.” Asgore, at least, knows who Spot is. He sighs, not sounding annoyed, just sounding… worried. 

“Would you like some water or perhaps iced tea?” He offers you quietly, and again, Sans glances at you. You honestly feel like you should be saying no, but your mouth is already dry. 

“Um. Yeah. Thanks. That would be really nice.” You say, and he gives you a small, tentative smile. 

“Right this way.” 

Well, honestly, you feel better not leaving your fiance in a tiny room with two people who have reason to be really mad at him. One, sure, but two? Too many. Now, you’re equally certain that he doesn’t like seeing you walk off with the king, given the worried glance he gives you, but…

Hey. You’re not a literal child. It’ll take quite a bit more to kill you, you think sarcastically, and lean over, giving Sans a kiss on the head before you leave. He meets your eyes one last time before you step outside, clearly trying to tell you something. Well. You suspect, again, you know what that something is. “Don’t trust him.” 

Gosh, could you have been _vaguer_?! When you figured out exactly how that message had happened, you were going to have to give yourself a piece of your damn mind, you think, feeling irritable and sweaty and thirsty and-

Ah. The fresh air of the throne room is suddenly one of the best things you’d ever felt. Asgore, too, sighs with relief when he steps out after you. 

“It is perhaps… not designed for four people in there.” He says guiltily. You feel yourself saying something stupid, something needling, and you can’t quite manage to stop yourself in time because you’re still hot and cranky and this guy was treating your kid like a nuclear weapon-

“Four and a half people, technically.” You say wryly, and his eyes dart down again, just for a second.

“I…” He begins, seemingly at a loss. You stand your ground, your brows inching upwards. “I’ll… go get that iced tea.” He looks at you awkwardly for another moment, and then turns, busying himself in the back of the throne room, where, behind a screen of climbing ivy, he seems to have set up some sort of kitchenette. 

You watch him for a moment, and then take a deep breath. The air smells so good in here, and there’s even a fresh breeze blowing from a doorway in the back of the room. Without thinking much about it, you begin to wander over, trying not to crush Papyrus’ hard work as you do so. The flowers here really are lovely. 

It’s nearly enough to make you forget that your last visit here had been marred by a spooky ghost kid. 

Lost in thought, you gaze into the dark hallway that the fresh air is billowing from, and jump slightly when Asgore clears his throat behind you. You spin at once, and manage a smile when the king sheepishly offers you a tall glass of iced tea.

“Have you seen it?” He asks you, nodding at the doorway as you accept the glass. You tilt your head slightly. 

“Er. Seen what?” 

Asgore smiles at that, and nods. “Come. It is a wonderful thing to see.” And without any more talking, he heads down the hallway, turns a corner and - oh -

“This is where the barrier first fell.” He says quietly. “This is where we found our freedom.” 

Sunlight speckles the end of the hallway. You glance at him and he nods encouragingly, so you take a step, then another, and then you’re outside, and you can see… oh, everything. You can see the mountains, and the bay, and Ebott Township, and an EbbCo outpost halfway down the mountain, and it’s all here, all spread out in front of this massive cliff like…

“This is what you saw, when you first left?” You say quietly, and he nods. 

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” He asks. “Frisk… I may never know how they did it. Or even what they did. But… they saved us all.” He says, almost reverently. You look around, taking in the massive space, the enormity that Sans must have felt, seeing the horizon for the first time. 

“It’s amazing.” You say quietly, and you’re surprised to hear just how choked up your voice sounds. Asgore is clearly surprised too. He stares at you for a long moment, and then takes a sip of his iced tea before he speaks. 

“_______, I fear… well. I know this will likely ring a little false now. But… I do wish to extend my congratulations.” He says quietly. You look at him for a moment.

“...Yeah.” You say, which is as noncommittal as you can get right now. He winces. 

“Green.” He says, after another awkward pause. “I had not heard that it was green.” It takes you a second to realize that he’s speaking about the Dot. 

“Um. Yeah. Does that mean something?” You say, feeling off-kilter. He studies you, then gives you a small smile. 

“Traditionally, souls that are green have been said to represent that their bearer is a kind person.” He says. You can’t help it; you glance down, quickly finding the Dot. 

“Oh. Sans never mentioned that…” You say. A kind person. You can stand that, you suppose. 

“Well, the younger monsters generally view it as superstition. Understandable. I suppose I am something of a traditionalist. But then... “ He exhales slowly. “My son’s soul was green as well.” He says quietly. 

“...Oh.” Well, that explains apologetic Asgore. It was one thing for him to be thinking “unknown threat to monsters, must find out destructive capabilities,” but now he was seeing you, and now this wasn’t just an unknown target. It was a soul. A green soul. Like the child he’d lost. And now, all of a sudden, this apologetic, sad man had reemerged. Well. That was kind of shitty, but… “Asgore.” You speak up suddenly. “Things don’t need to be this way. _Please._ I’m just…. I got so, so lucky. Do you understand? I got insanely lucky. I’m the only one. I’m the only human who gets this, who gets to have a child with the monster they love. It’s not something bad. It’s not a threat. It’s my kid. It’s something beautiful. It’s... “ You trail off, and look over the mountainside, all of the earth spread out in front of you. “It’s what we can be. Humans and monsters. Together.” You mutter, after a moment. “It’s something good.” 

Another long moment passes, then Asgore surprises you. He bows his head, and he says, “You are right, of course. I… I have been acting out of fear, of late. I can not help but feel that something… something is coming. It has been so quiet.”

“I know.” You say softly. “Well. Not quiet for us. Gaster’s back out. Asgore, he tried to kill-” 

“I know.” He says softly. “I… Perhaps I acted rashly there as well. I was incensed. But I believe this decision was still the correct one. There are things we need him for. For the safety of us all.” He says. You want so desperately to believe him. 

“He tried to kill me. And Sans. And Capra. And he did kill Paula, Asgore. The human authorities would be _pissed_...” You begin, then, seeing the mulish set of his mouth, sigh. “Just… don’t let him hurt us. Or anyone.” You mutter after a moment. He nods slowly, and the two of you look out over the landscape again. You take a sip of your neglected iced tea, after a moment. It’s delicious, of course. It’s magic food. 

“You and Sans still need to marry.” Asgore says, after a while. You wince. 

“Yep.” 

“Do you know where you wish to hold the wedding?” He asks, peering down at you. 

“Er… nope.” You admit. He lets out a soft chuckle at that, and then looks around at the spacious plateau you’ve stepped out onto. 

“My wife suggested you might have the ceremony here.” He says, sounding a little shy. You blink, surprised, then look around. 

“Oh… oh, really?” You say, startled. “You know, um, we’d have some human guests too-”

“Then isn’t this a wonderful place?” He says, nodding at the space. You hesitate, then nod as well. The thing is, he’s right. It is a _wonderful_ place. And knowing what it means to the monsters… and well, the reception could be anywhere, but the ceremony itself…

“I’d have to ask Sans.” You say quietly, but you’re smiling a little and Asgore sees that. 

“Would you like me to go get him?” He asks. “Or, er, at the very least, I could tell him where you are.” 

Well, yeah. Sans would want to know that. 

“Um, if you don’t mind? That would be great.” You say, turning around and already trying to envision the space. It would take some setup. Maybe some plants and fencing to make sure nobody wandered off the edge of the cliff… some bushes, definitely, to block off _this_ view, because that was the mountain road that wound all the way to the peak of Ebott, down there, and when you saw that your mind tended to drift to car accidents and dead parents and…

“I’ll be right back.” Asgore says, seeing that you’re already lost in thought. He’s smiling again, though, and you feel almost like you’re doing him a favor by considering this. Don’t trust him? You turn to look at him again, but he’s already ducked back inside. 

Hmph. 

You stand out there for a while, slowly drinking your iced tea and feeling the breeze in your hair, trying to picture the ceremony up here. This could be… it could be good. It could be really good. And it really is such a beautiful spot… beautiful enough to almost make up for the fact that you couldn’t even enjoy the open bar at your own wedding, you think wryly. Well. You’d see what Sans thought. About this spot, not about the, uh, open bar. 

It takes you some time spent daydreaming before you notice that one patch of the grass on this plateau is moving a little... oddly. Where everything else is swaying gently in the breeze, this is moving like there’s maybe some sort of animal scurrying around underneath? Oh, is it a mole monster? Are those real? They.. oh, there has to be something like that, right? 

“Um… hello?” Oh, you’re going to feel so stupid if you’re talking to like… an actual mole. 

“Frisk?” A quiet, worried, familiar voice responds almost at once. You’ve heard that voice before, you can- “You came! You finally came! You need to… oh. It’s you.” The speaker has come into view now, and you brace yourself. 

It’s a cheerful yellow flower that’s slowly forcing itself out of the ground. 

“Um. I’m sorry. I’m not Frisk.” You say, feeling.. strange. “But you… you’re…”  
“Nobody. Forget it.” The flower says quickly - already, it’s shrinking back into the ground. 

“Wait. Do you need help? I know Frisk. They’re my cousin. I could-”

“You do?” The flower stops shrinking. “Oh. Gee. Um. Can you tell them that As-” It begins, then cuts itself off. “Flowey.” It finally decides. “Can you tell ‘em that Flowey needs their - oh.” It cuts itself off, and when it speaks again, something like dread has crept into its voice. “No. Not now. Oh no. No, no, no….” It begins to pull itself back down into the ground again, sounding panicked, but something’s happening - the green of its stem is withering and turning brown, its petals are falling off one by one, blowing away, its face fades from the pale center of the flower, and then…

Just as a gust of wind picks up, the flower transforms, bursting open like a dandelion to expose a nearly perfect orb of fluffy whiteness. For a split second it quivers there, a snowy globe, and then the wind billows once more and it’s, at once, all gone. 

With a plummeting feeling of anxiety in your stomach, you watch as the breeze carries hundreds of seeds further and further away from you, off in all directions. You look down at Ebott, and you wonder where those seeds will land.

You wonder what Flowey had needed Frisk for. 

You wonder what those seeds might do when they land. 

Oh, god, there is way too much that you just don’t know.


	122. Wherein Ghost Goes Full Garfield

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did it. I did the move. Chapters may still be slightly erratic because me too I am erratic too.
> 
> [come to my tumblr, where if you choose you can support my brokeass in the end of a move](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
> (seriously I am a poormn)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ We stream tonight, I'll be there soon!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“you’re sure he was right here?” Sans asks for what feels like the thousandth time. You sigh and nod. 

“Like, the surest I’ve ever been about anything, babe.” 

**”Flowey! Please come out!”** Frisk is so loud in your head that you almost reach to cover your ears, remembering at the last second that this would be a particularly futile move. 

You’d gone to get Frisk from Toriel’s as soon as Sans had finished reviewing the tapes and data (which, to nobody’s surprise but perhaps his own, had shown a perfectly well behaved Gaster working in the lab, eating, sleeping, and generally acting how one would expect a non-sinister scientist to act.) 

Toriel had been first surprised, then confused. 

“That little flower from the ruins? The one who always was misbehaving?” She said, her brow wrinkling. “My child, why would that flower be looking for your help?” Frisk’s eyes had gone wide as soon as you’d passed along the news, and they appeared agitated, pacing back and forth and tugging at your sleeve at the mention of Flowey, forgetting for the moment that you could understand them when they talked. They’d merely shaken their head at Toriel’s question and then looked up at you with enormous, begging eyes. 

“Well, it, uh… I mean, Frisk, you heard the part about the seeds, right?” You’d asked quietly. 

**”Please. We need to go.”** Frisk had insisted. Toriel had hesitated for a moment, then shrugged. 

“They may go play with the flower, as long as you keep an eye on them. And they should be back home before supper.” She’d said, clearly not half as worried as Frisk was. Sans, too, had shrugged, though you thought you could spy a hint of worry in his eyes. 

“Should we really be bringing Frisk there if Flowey might have… you know?” You’d muttered in his (lack of) ear, while Toriel was insisting on one last hug before Frisk left. Sans grimaced, then shrugged. 

“you said just seeds, right? no dust?”

“Yeah.” 

“k. then yeah. ‘s probably cool. plant monsters are weird, i suppose. hard to really kill. some of them want you to eat ‘em, even.” He said quietly. You’d done a double take at that. 

“Okay, that’s disgusting, though.” 

“i know. they taste really bad.” He’d said, and you hadn’t had enough time to be able to tell if he was joking or not before Frisk was tugging at your arm again, accidentally getting a little rough with the fine bones of your wrist. You’d tried to hide a wince, but Sans, of course, had noticed. “hey, kid, go easy on your cousin.” He’d ordered at once.

**”Sorry. Can we please go now?!** Frisk had demanded. Sans still looked a little grouchy about it, but after a moment, he nodded, and traced a doorway back up to the cliffside. And now: 

**”Flowey!”** Frisk calls again, sounding quite panicked now. 

But nobody comes. 

“kid.” Sans begins slowly. “it would be a lot easier if you just told us, uh, what was going on? we could help, i guess.” Frisk spins and bites their lip, looking Sans over for a long moment, then glancing over at you. 

**”You wouldn’t understand. Flowey, are you there?”** They say, resuming their call. You sigh. Sans winces, then clears his throat. 

“did uh… frisk. buddy. ‘s just that, uh… you know i’m not totally clear on what happened underground, right? but i do remember one thing about the day you let us out, before everything goes fuzzy. papyrus. he said a flower told him to bring everyone to that room. before it all went black. and if that’s the same flower we’re dealin’ with now, i’ve got some pretty big questions.”

Frisk barely spares him a glance. Sans looks up at you, perhaps hoping for help, but you don’t know anything more than he does. He hesitates, then says, “frisk. i know you know more than you’re lettin’ on. please. let us help.” Frisk groans, stamping their small foot. 

**”You wouldn’t get it! Nobody does! Nobody did!”** They say. **”This is my fault!”**

“what did you do?” Sans voice still sounds friendly, but there’s a hard note behind it you just don’t like. You react instinctively, moving to his side and taking his hand. Frisk, again, looks between the two of you, then scowls, their little mouth obstinate. 

**”It doesn’t matter. He’s not even here.”** They say flatly. **”I wanna go back home.”**

“it matters to me.” Sans says, and even though he’s smiling, there’s not even a basic resemblance of cheerfulness in his tone now. His eyes are very dim, entirely fixed on Frisk. 

Nope, you don’t like that one bit. 

“It’s okay, Frisk.” You say, before Frisk can shrink back more than a step. “I know you’re upset right now, but you don’t need to say anything you don’t want to, sweetie. It’s okay.” They look up at you, and you see just how bright their eyes are now; they’re on the verge of tears. “Oh, jeez. I’m so sorry, bud. C’mere.” You get down on their level, holding your arms open for a hug. They hesitate for a moment that feels like several hours, but then they run forward, holding you tight and sniffling into your t-shirt. “Shhh. It’s okay. You know we’ll help however we can, right? We promise. If there’s anything at all that we can do…” You look up at Sans, waiting for him to chime in. He takes a second, then sighs. 

“yeah. i’m sorry, kid. i know it’s hard to talk about still. i just wish… i’m sorry.” He says quietly, then leans over, ruffling Frisk’s hair. Frisk looks up at him for a second, puffy-eyed and slightly indignant, then nods.  
 **”Can we go back to mom’s? I’m sorry. I thought I could… I’m sorry.”** Their voice is practically a whisper in your mind. You nod, hugging them tight for a second longer. 

“You wanted to help your friend. You’re a good kid.” You tell them quietly. Sans looks slightly surprised at that. 

“...friend.” He repeats, trying the thought out, then looks back at Frisk. “sorry, kid. let’s take you back home. see what your mom was bakin’ there, huh? it looked pretty appe- _pies_ -ing.” 

Frisk lets out a little watery giggle at that, and nods, and Sans ruffles their hair one more time before he cuts a door back to Toriel’s. 

\------------------------------------------------------------

Of course, when you’re back at your own home, the two of you need to have A Talk. He sees it coming a mile away, of course, because he’s extra sweet, just like he had been at Toriel’s; he goes off at once to get you a glass of lemonade (was everyone just getting you drinks because you were _pregnant?_ Not that it was exactly something to complain about but, well, your legs still worked!). He even comes back eating an apple, which nearly _is_ enough to make you melt - it was one thing to get him to eat, but to get him to eat something healthy?

Still.

“Babe-” You begin, but he interrupts.

“i know. i was way too hard on the kid.” He says, rubbing his skull. “i know that’s not reassuring for you. i’m not gonna be like that as a dad, promise. swear to everything.” 

“Oh.” Oh, you actually hadn’t thought of that. “I mean, I was honestly just worried about Frisk. They’re really upset.” You sigh. “I’m a little upset too, honestly. That wasn’t a pretty thing to watch. Well. It was kind of pretty, but I can’t help but feel that our friend the flower going to seed wasn’t exactly a good development. Strange things are happening, Sans. I… don’t really like strange things. They seem to end up with us trying to not get killed a lot of the time.” 

“i know.” He says, now sounding quite serious. “‘s why i was gettin’ pretty… uncool, back there. babe, frisk _knows_ something. frisk knows a lot of stuff, and they won’t share and it was one thing when it was just me, but now it’s you, and it’s the dot, and…” He takes a breath, then shakes his head. 

“We’ve got to show them that it’s safe to speak to us.” You remind him quietly. 

“i know. i know. i’m just tryin’ to keep everyone safe.” He mutters, and looks up at you, so worried, that you relent and lean in to kiss him.   
“Come on.” You murmur, after a moment. “No point worrying about something we can’t do anything about right now. Or, I guess, a lot of somethings. Let’s just watch some TV? Normal night? We’ve both got work in the morning.”

“don’t remind me.” He groans, then nods. “yeah. let’s do that.” 

\-----------------------------------------------

You have the TV to yourself for a while, which is something of a rarity. Well, there’s other TVs in the house, of course, but everyone preferred the big one in the family room, so it was really luck of the draw if you would get to pick what you wanted, or if you’d have to tolerate Undyne’s UFC matches or Capra’s endless repetitions of Game of Thrones episodes or Papyrus’ weird VHS tapes of slightly off-brand 80’s cartoons. 

Since it was just you and Sans, and since Sans was still being sweet, you get to put on Princess Bride and settle in, your legs across his lap and under a blanket.

“I shouldn’t get too comfy.” You sigh. “I need food eventually.” 

“oh, i forgot to tell you that mettaton’s cooking something enormous in there. capra’s helping. kinda. you’ll get fed.” He assures you with a laugh, running his fingers idly through your hair. 

“Mmm.” You sigh, then remember yourself. Oh, he knows that always distracts you! “I mean, good. Mettaton is really good at cooking.” 

“uh, when he’s not swooning at cap, anyway.” Sans says dryly, not relenting on his scalp massage - oh, he’s really trying to suck up, way more than the situation calls for. You think about this for a second, then realize, guiltily, what the problem is. You might not have been worrying about what kind of dad he’s going to be, but his behavior towards Frisk almost certainly has _him_ worried. 

“Sans.” You look up at him. “You’re gonna be the best father to our kid. I don’t want you to worry about that. You’re gonna be so good.” 

His hand falls still, and for a second, he looks like he might pretend this wasn’t a concern. Then he says, slowly, a little shyly, “you sure?” 

You have to snicker at that. “Babe, you almost went to war with Asgore over this kid. You’re gonna be good. You’re gonna worry too much, but-”

“i lost too much. ‘s why i worry.” He explains himself quickly, as if he’s been waiting for a chance to explain this behavior. “i know it doesn’t seem like it, know it seems like i’ve got everything, but underground…” His eyes are unfocused for a moment, then he shakes his head, clearing it. “i’m not gonna lose you. or the dot. or any of my family.” He says firmly, reaching again, letting his hand cover your abdomen. “i’m done losing.” He says, and leans over - he’s going to kiss you properly. 

“I know, you keep saying that, but if you wanna stop losing, you’re going to have to get better at your hook shot.” Capra sidles his way neatly into your conversation, having arrived in the room nearly silently - ah, yes, the third member of the matching sneakers team had arrived, and they were, in fact, good for sneaking. 

Sans stops what he’s doing and sits back up, looking a little irritated. “cap, i’ve told you this a million times, throwing crumpled up pieces of paper that you don’t like the numbers on into the trash? doesn’t mean you’re good at basketball.”

“You just say that because I’m better than you.” Capra snickers. “Oh, hey. Princess Bride!” And with that, your brief moment of privacy is over; he flops down on one side of the loveseat, scooting it closer to the coffee table in the middle of the room. Oh, that’s new. He usually claims the recliner, but then… 

“Where’s your boyfriend, Cap?” You try not to make “boyfriend” sound like a schoolyard taunt. You really do. You just don’t do a great job of it. Capra notices and grimaces, but after a moment he manages to press onward.

“He’s bringing out the lasagna. Papyrus just really, really, really wanted to take over as helper at the end, so I made myself scarce.” He says with a wry smile, then shrugs. “So what did you guys get up to today?” 

“oh. the usual.” Sans says very blandly. Capra notices his tone and expression at last. 

“You, uh, alright there, buddy?” He says, both eyebrows raised. Sans takes a moment to collect himself, then sighs. 

“yeah. yeah, i’m fine.” He mutters. “how about you? good day?”

Capra smirks for a second, looking smug in a way that gives you way, way too much information, then shrugs. “Yeah. Pretty good.” And that’s it. No more details. Ugh, if he wants you to ask, he’s severely mistaken about how interested you are in his love life-

“THE LASAGNA IS READY!” Papyrus bellows, sprinting (oh, that’s not necessary) into the room, arms full of plates and cutlery, Ghost hot on his heels and meowing pathetically. 

“Oh, you don’t even like lasagna.” You scold your cat, then smile as Mettaton walks in, a large, steaming tray in his hands. He’s not wearing oven mitts, which makes you flinch for a split second before you recall that his hands are metal. “Mettaton, that smells so good. Oh, man, I’m starving!” His face lights up with the praise. 

“Oh, thank you darling, but I can’t take all the credit. Peter-”

“AND PAPYRUS!”

“-and Papyrus helped.” He says with a chuckle, settling down in the seat next to Capra and beginning to serve the food. Papyrus sits on Sans’ other side, Ghost immediately hopping into his lap. You grin at that, and Sans at last, reluctantly, lifts his hand from your stomach to pass a plate of lasagna to you. 

“So, what did you two do today?” Mettaton also asks, looking, if possible, smugger than Capra. Gah, do the two of them really want you to ask that question back at them? You get it! They were having weird CEO/robot sex! You don’t need to know about that!

“uh, looked at wedding locations.” Sans drawls, exercising what used to be his secret power whenever Capra got too obnoxious. For once, though, Cap doesn’t seem entirely stricken with disgust at the idea of an eternal commitment. 

“Oh. Yeah. About that. Who are you inviting to the wedding?” He demands, looking at you. You shrug. 

“Uh, you three, Alphys and Undyne, LD, Tori, Frisk, Asgore, um…”

“grillbz.” Sans says lazily. “oh. aaron and tommy.” 

“Okay, so that’s like seven people.” Capra points out. 

“hey, i have tons of friends.” Sans laughs. “it’ll be fine.” 

“Oh, I know _you_ do.” Capra drawls. “But what about her?”

“Hey! I have friends?” You protest weakly. 

“Name one you haven’t already mentioned.” He says, taking a bite of lasagna. “Oh, hell, Threep, this is good!” 

“Why, thank you. I had excellent help.” Mettaton purrs. 

“YES, BUT DON’T RUB IT IN OR PETER WILL GET JEALOUS OF MY SKILLS!” Papyrus cackles, mouth full of lasagna. You burst out laughing, relieved this talk is over, but Capra is undeterred. 

“I’m waiting. Who else?” He says, arching an eyebrow. 

“...Spot.” You say weakly. 

“Spot.” He repeats. 

“...Cody?” You try, ignoring that Sans is looking at you in absolute bewilderment for the fact that you’re talking about inviting a dude you barely know to your wedding. 

“Look. I’m just saying. Even though nobody’s asked me to be in the wedding party for some sort of staggering oversight of a reason.” He says pointedly. “People are going to pay attention to this wedding. And they’re going to think it’s really weird if there’s a hundred monsters and four humans in attendance. Right?” He looks at both of you seriously. 

“uh. s’pose.” Sans says, shrugging. 

“That’s why I told the summer interns that they have to try out to be your friend tomorrow night.” Capra says happily. 

“... _What._ ” You hiss, shaking your head. 

“He’s quite right, darling. From a PR standpoint, you simply need more human friends. Well. More friends, period.” Mettaton says, resting a hand on Capra’s back. 

Sans, that traitor, begins to snicker very quietly. 

“I’m not having friend try-outs!” You protest. 

“i dunno. the interns are nice this summer. and you, uh, do need more friends.” Sans says. You glare at him until he halfheartedly says, “or, uh, whatever.” 

“I DON’T UNDERSTAND?” Papyrus interjects. “WHY WOULDN’T YOU WANT MORE FRIENDS? ISN’T FRIENDSHIP ONE OF THE BEST THINGS IN THE WORLD? ISN’T FRIENDSHIP WHAT KEEPS HUMANS AND MONSTERS FROM HURTING EACH OTHER? WE WOULD NEVER HAVE MADE IT OUT OF THE UNDERGROUND IF IT WASN’T FOR BEING FRIENDS WITH FRISK!” He looks at you, all big, hurt eyes. “IS FRIENDSHIP WRONG?” He asks, so earnestly that you break. 

“Fine. Fine. I’ll… this is ridiculous, I’m not a charity case, I’ve made friends before-”

“Great. Whatever. Come by EbbCo after you’re done at the aquarium. I set up a picnic.” Capra says, now sounding triumphant.

“Oh, darling, we should film this. It could be a pilot for a new reality series.” Mettaton proposes.

“CAN I MAKE NEW FRIENDS TOO?” 

“Sure, champ.” Capra laughs. 

“This is ridiculous.” You sigh again.

“hey, at least it’s not, uh, spooky murder stuff?” Sans points out quietly. 

Goddamn it. 

He has a point.


	123. Wherein You Have Friend Tryouts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [come to my tumblr, where if you choose you can support my brokeass in the end of a move](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>  (seriously I am a poormn)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ We stream tonight, I won't be there for all of it because a friend is coming over but you know who will be is those goodboys Wrexie and Ona](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

The only thing worse than a company picnic is when it’s not even your own company. Well, technically, some people would argue that EbbCo was as much yours as anyone’s, but they probably didn’t know Capra. EbbCo was his, now, and he certainly did a better job of running the business that you ever could have. Or at least poured way more of himself into it. For example:

“Cap, this is like, _stupid_ big for a company party.” You hiss at his elbow, feeling a little out of sorts. It’s been a while since you’d last been here… okay, fine, you’d been avoiding it as much as possible since the whole “almost dying here” incident.

“We posted record profits this quarter, thanks to your beautiful idiot of a fiance getting us hooked up to the core.” Capra drawls, clearly itching to dive into the thick of it. “Besides. The employees need something to celebrate. A bunch of them were stuck underground while your aunt drank their blood, remember?” 

“Okay. Well, when you put it like that it sounds really weird and bad.” You sigh. “But…” Okay, so the ice sculptures were definitely unnecessary. The uniformed waitstaff bringing around mini-tacos and margarita shots and individual shrimp cocktails, even more unnecessary. The multiple buffet lines, the cheese bar, the live band getting set up, the busy open bar... “This is gonna be nicer than my wedding.” You groan. Capra stares at you. 

“Absolutely not.” He says, sounding astonished. “We can do better than this! This barely has _anything!_ It’s just a picnic!” 

“Oh god. Where’s Sans?” You whimper. You’d come here right after work, just having enough time to change from your uniform polo and khakis to black jean shorts and a band t-shirt, and you were feeling not only lost but supremely underdressed right now. Capra’s eyebrows raise. 

“You see Sans literally every hour of every day.” Capra exaggerates lazily. “He went home to get Papyrus, but you’re not supposed to be hanging out with him. You’re here to make new friends, remember?”

“...Don’t wanna.” You mutter childishly, then look back up at him. “Where’s Mettaton?” He blinks at that. 

“Uh, home, probably.” He says slowly. 

“Oh, did he not want to come?” You ask, though you suspect you already know the answer from the look on his face. “Oh, jeez. Cap, you didn’t invite him?” 

“...Do people normally invite their… uh, boyfriends,” He forces the word out, “to things like this?”   
You nod at the crowd. “Did you tell _them_ they could invite their significant others?” You drawl. 

“Of course.” He says, then sighs. “Shit.” 

“...Do you want me to go get him?” You ask, watching several emotions cross his face in quick succession. You’re almost interrupted when an older man approaches, dressed immaculately, hand outstretched for Capra’s, but Cap just holds up a ‘give me a minute’ hand, and the guy walks away, looking very deflated.

“Nah. I’ll text Sans.” He decides. You suspect Sans is dragging his heels about coming to this party, and probably having a good time messing around with Papyrus (and most likely Undyne as well, who’d been absolutely stoked to realize that Capra hadn’t remembered to invite her.) “Stop procrastinating. Look. Interns are over by the oyster bar. Go over and make friends. Actually, you know what? C’mon.” He jerks his head in a way that means ‘follow me,’ and with a feeling of dread, you tail him, trying to prolong the inevitable. It doesn’t work. You’re in front of a group of six people, all roughly your age, before you know it. They’d all been laughing hard about something, but when Capra approaches, they fall silent.

“So like I said, if we tweak the algorithm-” One short guy says, clearly trying to make it sound like they’d been chatting about work, but the sleek black cat monster next to him elbows him, and he trails off with a noise that sounds like a balloon deflating. 

“Interns,” Capra says sternly. “This is ______. Her parents made this company what it is. She needs friends. Be her friend - if you want.” He quickly avoids making an order.

A chorus of anxious “hi”s come from the group. You consider tunneling underground and pretending this didn’t happen. Surely you could go back in time to prevent this, right?

“Uh. Hi, guys. Sorry.” You say, biting your lip. 

“You good?” Capra checks, looking at you. You want to hit him. 

“Yeah. You’d better go find your _boyfriend._ ” You drawl, giving yourself just the slightest bit of revenge. He grimaces, pats your shoulder, then walks off to mingle. 

There’s a long, very awkward pause, and then the short human who spoke up earlier says, despairingly, 

“He’s got a _boyfriend?!_ ”

The rest of the group bursts out laughing, and the cat shakes his head again. 

“Sorry, Dave.” He sighs, then stretches luxuriously. “You’ll have to redecorate your locker now.” Dave rolls his eyes, then looks back at you. 

“It’s really nice to meet you! You’re his friend? How did that happen? I heard you were an intern too? Did you-” 

“He already said that her parents made the company.” A haughty looking guy on the other side of the oyster bar says with a sigh. “Your crush is getting in the way of your analytical skills yet again, Adams.” He sneers for a second longer at the short guy, then looks at you. “Hi. I’m Kenji. That’s Dave and Shadow-” He nods at the short boy and the tall black cat, “and that’s Alexa, Natalie and Bud Light.” 

“ _Corona._ ” The green fire monster hisses irritably, then tosses her head, a cascade of flame following the movement like an annoyed flick of her hair. “And you sound like an ass when you make that joke. I’m sorry we didn’t have your disgusting human beer in the underground when my dad was naming me-”

“Relax.” Shadow drawls, sauntering over to the oyster bar and picking a shellfish out from the crushed ice. His eyes flick over lazily to you, then down to the skarm, then, for a split second, to the Dot. That is really starting to get annoying. “Heard about you.” He yawns after a moment. “You got some legal services from a cousin of mine.” 

“I think that’s supposed to be confidential.” One of the human women says - Alexa, right, you remember that. She’s gorgeous, with long blonde hair and perfect makeup and a chic, professional outfit that makes you feel even stupider for wearing jorts. “I’m pretty sure that that’s a universal thing, that lawyers owe a duty of confidentiality to their clients which should extend to their identities. Shadow, you should tell your cousin that he’s being very bad.” She says, and you shake your head. 

“No! No. It’s fine. Lawyerpants helped me out of a few binds. He’s great.” You assure them all.

“So, who is Capra’s boyfriend?” Dave interjects. You clear your throat, wishing that you could be drinking something, anything, just to make this less awkward. 

“Um. Have you guys… you know Mettaton, right-”

“WHAT?” The word is echoed from every single person’s lips at once, and then it’s all you can do to keep up with their questions.

“How the hell did they even meet?” Kenji demands, looking entertained.

“Oh, um, Mettaton’s a friend of my fiance? Or, er, actually not that much. He’s a friend of my best friend’s wife?”  
“Who’s your fiance?” Corona wants to know.

“Um. Sans?”

“WHAT?” 

“Like, Sans from work?” Alexa says.

“The one who practically built the prototype for the new core singlehandedly?” Dave says, looking staggered. 

“... My dad’s friend?” Corona says quietly, then takes a breath. “I need a drink. Anyone else?” As the other interns clamor to place their orders with her, Shadow clears his throat pointedly, Corona tilts her head, looks at you again, and then asks you, quietly, “Er, soda, lemonade, water?” 

“Um. Some soda would be great.” You decide, sighing internally. No way to keep the Dot a secret. “And your dad’s really nice.” Well, obviously she was Grillby’s daughter, you should have figured that out before. Unless.. well, it probably wasn’t cool to assume all fire monsters were related. 

“But when did this happen?” Dave presses on. “The Mettaton thing?” Shadow rolls his eyes again, and Kenji looks spectacularly bored. Natalie, who’s been hovering at the edge, mostly quiet, says, 

“It was, um, all over the news yesterday. There was this big thing at that karaoke bar downtown? Don’t any of you guys read the… ugh, of course not. You know there’s stuff other than numbers and hard science, right?” 

“At least our department _does_ something.” Kenji snorts. “Not all of us can be pity hires, some of us need to get stuff done-” 

“Woah.” You hear yourself interjecting, feeling alarmed for the poor girl, but she simply shrugs. 

“Don’t worry about him. That’s just Kenji. And he’s just salty because I didn’t have to go through seven rounds of interviews.I’m in the archaeology department. I mean, I kind of _am_ the archaeology department.” She explains, looking gratefully at Corona as she returns, passing everyone who’d asked for a drink their choice - she’d clearly worked in a restaurant before. 

“Tell her the staggering qualifications that got you the job.” Kenji jeers, and Shadow, who seems to enjoy playing peacekeeper, strolls over next to him and gives him a very disdainful look. Natalie and Alexa, too, look profoundly unimpressed with Kenji. 

“After Mr. Capra’s” (oh, that’s weird) “terrible accident, he had to go to physical therapy a few times a week. We met there. I was getting robot knees.” She says with a shrug.

“...What?” You say after a second, when nobody else seems startled by that. 

“Oh, I uh, have a condition. Like arthritis. Well, almost exactly like - well, whatever. I needed my knees replaced. So we learned how to walk again, together.” She says. “I’ve got some really bitchin’ scars, do you wanna see-”

“Please, not again.” Corona begs. 

“Would have been way easier if my bones were just out like that.” Natalie sighs wistfully, looking at your skarm. 

“About that,” Kenji begins, “So, you’re a human or a monster or…” He trails off when you simply shrug. 

“I’m, uh, whatever.” You say after a moment’s thought. Shadow thinks about this for a second or two, his tail flicking, and then his face splits into a broad, pleased, pointy smile. 

“I like her.” He announces happily. 

“well, good. she’s great.” You jump slightly, not expecting Sans’ voice, but then you grin at him as he sidles up next to you, wrapping his arm around your waist and turning up his face for a quick kiss as he does so. 

“Uh, guys, this is my fiance, Sans. I dunno if you’ve met yet.”

“I’d been hoping!” Alexa pipes up. “Mr., uh-”

“please don’t call me mr.” He grumbles.

“Sans, then. Um, could you explain the coil technique you used to amplify the geothermic output? Even Corona doesn’t get it. It’s amazing.” She begins, her eyes huge with admiration. Sans looks startled. 

“uh, you guys really wanna hear about that?”

“Please?” Kenji and Dave say simultaneously - it’s the first time all evening that Kenji’s sounded polite. 

“uh, ok, sure. does someone have paper? uh, never mind, i’ll just -” He abruptly traces a doorway and steps back just a second later, his arms full of notebooks with a laptop balanced on top. You eye him, but smile a little. He’s in his happy place, and so, clearly, are Dave, Kenji, Shadow, Corona and Alexa. Though Natalie…

“Uh, hey, you wanna check out what’s on those buffet lines?” You propose, arching an eyebrow, and she nods, relieved.

“Thank god. Yes. Please. Yes.” She says. You chuckle, give Sans another quick kiss on the side of his head, and head off with Natalie over to a non-oyster section of the picnic, listening as some washed up 90’s one-hit-wonder band begins to tune up. 

“So, Peter, Mettaton, Sans AND Dr. Alphys all live in your house?” Natalie begins, clearly burning with curiosity. You blink, then chuckle. 

“Um. Yep. Somehow, that happened. Did Cap talk a lot during PT?” 

“...When he wasn’t complaining.” She admits. “I’m glad he finally decided to date Mettaton, though. They look happy, don’t they?” She nods across the open space outside the EbbCo building, where Mettaton and Capra are standing, surrounded by an ever growing throng of toadies. They both seem to be enjoying the attention, it’s true. 

“I suppose they do.” You say with a laugh. “So. Archaeology? What does he have you doing?” 

“Oh! Man, when he found out that I was double majoring in Archaeology and History, and that my research project was on sites found in the caves around here, he begged me to come to work. They’re expanding underground just about every day, you know? Well, I’m sure you know. You’re engaged to Sans and you live with Peter-”

“We haven’t had much time to chat about work, to be honest.” You admit. 

“Well, anyway, there’s tons of government regulations, no construction in areas of archaeological importance, so Peter wanted me taking a look in all the new systems we open up. I actually need to talk to him, because the one they cracked into today is totally a no-go. I don’t know if it was humans or monsters in there, but there’s tons of scrolls and pottery and even some cave paintings, and I didn’t even touch anything but it all looks like it’s monster-war stuff…” 

“You’re kidding me.” You say flatly, and she looks up at you, eyes bright. 

“Are you interested in that stuff?” She asks brightly. “It’s all in another language, I can’t even begin to read it, but it’s still cool!” You look at her for another long moment, and then you clear your throat. 

“Uh, how do you feel about maybe… working together on what you find down there? I mean… I can probably read it, at least.” It’s her turn to look startled. 

“Seriously? Nobody can from the whole history department at the university-”

“Well, no _human_ can…” You begin. She stares again, then understanding flashes across her face. 

“And you are not exactly human. Oh. Oh wow. This could be…” A big, overjoyed smile is slowly crawling across her face. She looks, in fact, just like the other interns had looked at the chance to talk to Sans. “This weekend?!” She says hopefully. 

“Um. Sure. I’ve gotta do some wedding planning stuff but obviously this is-”

“I can help with that! I’ve been to like a billion weddings, I have seven older siblings!” Natalie says urgently, still beaming. 

Oh goddamn it. Capra was right. 

You’d made a human friend.


	124. Wherein You Go Spelunking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [this chapter provided in part by our corporate sponsor: Flaming Hot Cheetos.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>  Like the motto says, "Flaming Hot Cheetos: Life Is Often Solitary And Confusing And You Rarely Get The Exact Outcome You Want, There Is No Such Thing As Fate, The Universe Is Random Cold And Arbitrary And The Only Things That You Can Count On Are Your Own Human Spirit, The Love Of Your Friends And Family, And Flaming Hot Cheetos."   
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> Twitch AU today, watch Wrexie do at [this link](https://www.twitch.tv/wrexie)

“Babe, I’m going to pick up Nat and hit the caves.” 

Your Saturdays have gotten really weird. 

“mmph? s’early.” Sans grumbles.

“It’s like ten. Don’t be a baby, leggo.” You snicker as he defiantly pulls you into a sleepy hug. 

“you’re sure it’s safe down there? i read it’s bad for pregnant ladies to be in places where they could breathe weird spores or funguses or mold-”

“Oh my god, Sans. You grew up down there. So did literally every monster we know, just about. If they all survived their moms being in caves, the Dot’ll be fine.” You laugh, wriggling free. 

“‘s just been every weekend this month.” He harrumphs, peeking his eyes open. You laugh, unable to resist it. 

“Yeah, and poor you has been so lonely with me gone. Capra introduced me to six people to make friends last month. I made one. You made friends with literally every single other one.” 

“not kenji.” 

“Kenji’s been trying so hard to suck up that he might as well be your friend. You accepted his invitation to that basketball game last week!” 

“well, yeah. box seats, sweet dunks, and he had a spare seat for paps.” He says, as if you’re being particularly dim. “obviously i was going to go to that.” 

“Well, obviously I’m going to help my new friend out on this human magic stuff, because A) She’s going with me and Undyne and Alphys to the dress appointment tomorrow, and B) I want more info on why my magic went missing those two times, or like, our baby, or Capra’s whole deal, or-”

“ok. ok. got it.” He laughs. “see you later this afternoon, though?”

“Uh, yeah, we’ve got a cake tasting… oh my god, look at your face, you are literally the world’s biggest baby!” You laugh, wrangling your way into a t-shirt and jeans. “Sorry, love, you gotta eat some food. Later.”

“no kiss?”

“ _One_ kiss.” You sigh, lean over, and kiss him lovingly enough to make up for all the teasing. He looks more cheerful after that, and gives you a lazy wave from bed as you cut a doorway into the hall outside Natalie’s dorm. You barely have time to rap on the door before she hurries out, a big grin on her face, with two headlamps, two huge mugs of coffee, and a backpack you know by now has her computer, a really good camera, and a few sample bags. 

“You ready? I think we’re gonna hit good stuff this time!” She says brightly, and you laugh. 

“Yeah, I mean, we’ll see. At the very least, we’ll be able to get the pictures of the wall murals we hadn’t gotten last time.” You’re feeling less optimistic than Natalie for the sheer reason that so far, you’d seen a lot of murals and carvings of humans apparently doing spectacular magic, but very little by the way of explanation as to how or what that magic really was. 

“No, no, I’m making an executive call. We’ve exhausted chambers one and two. It’s time to move onto the next one.” Natalie says happily. 

“Hey! Alright!” You say, pleasantly surprised. “Maybe this one will be a little easier to understand!” 

“We can only hope.” Nat presses the mug of coffee into your hand. You think it might be a little bigger than a pregnant lady is strictly supposed to drink, but, hey, Sans isn’t here to complain, so you gratefully accept. 

“Okay. Let’s go!” 

Natalie’s gotten used to the process of cutting doorways over the past month. She’s adapted alarmingly well to all the weirdness in your life, starting with the fact that you can control magic just like a monster can. Well, and then the revelation that no, you couldn’t go to the bar after you got out of the cave - or well, you could, it was just that you had this, uh… 

She’d managed the news that her new friend was pregnant very well, and had immediately promised that she’d get to work looking for any history of a human/monster pregnancy. Nothing had turned up, of course, but the both of you were hoping that the new cave would provide more information. 

The system that EbbCo had accidentally broken into seemed to be at least a few thousand years old, with regards to humans using it, anyway. However, you and Natalie had discovered that the first chamber you’d broken into was probably one of the deepest and certainly oldest in a chain of chambers that seemed to show clear technological advances, the closer and closer you got to the surface. It had both of you a little on edge, how old the stuff in the caves were. 

“I feel like we should have someone else making sure we don’t ruin any of this.” You’d actually said, your first day underground. “It seems like all of this is so easy to, um, break by accident.” Natalie grimaced, then leaned in. 

“Um, okay. So. Here’s the thing. We’re not… exactly? Supposed to be doing this?” She’d muttered.

“Uh oh.” 

“That’s one of King Asgore’s treaty stipulations, that any discoveries found in the Underground systems are technically monster property, even if it’s clearly humans who made it. When I told you about, you know, no construction in areas of archaeological significance and government regulations… it goes a little deeper. One of the things EbbCo had to agree to was to halt all expansion into any unknown, previously inhabited areas. So….”

“...So, technically, we’re not here.” You’d tested the thought out. “Nat, why do you even want to do this if we might be breaking like, interspecies law?” 

She’d looked at you like you had three heads. 

“It’s an undisturbed site that’s thousands of years old that humans might _never_ get a chance to research, at least once King Asgore gets wind of it!” She’d exclaimed. “I don’t know about you, but I’m not throwing away my shot.” 

“...Aw, jeez, are you into the rapping Founding Fathers too?” You’d sighed, and she’d given you a crooked grin. 

“I mean, I let Peter borrow the album from me. He’s been playing it a lot, huh?” She laughs, seeming triumphant, and just like that, the moral horizon had been crossed, and the two of you were committed to creepin’ in caves. Though she’d made sure to say, “Though, I mean, aside? If you hear any monsters coming, please try to grab me when you run, because, again, brand new robot knees.” 

“...Sure thing.” 

And so for the past month, you had been, indeed, straight cave creepin’. Sans had thought it was all sort of funny, of course, but not funny enough to make him go with the two of you. 

(“nah. stayin’ where the sun shines. just make a shortcut if you hear anything funny,” had been his actual advice). 

You trace a doorway into the first chamber, the one that an EbbCo excavator had accidentally broken into, and the two of you turn on your headlamps, getting used to the sudden chill in the air. 

“Careful!” Natalie hisses, and you roll your eyes. She’s told you to be careful nearly every time you take a step. Well, she’s dead serious about not disturbing anything. Much to your displeasure, you had yet to even touch the scrolls - Nat had determined they were probably going to fall apart if handled even a little, so whatever information was in there was going to have to stay in there for now. The jars containing the scrolls didn’t provide you much by the way of guidance, either; you were sure this was the same language as in the Badbad book, but you couldn’t begin to decipher what these meant. So, your work had really been trying to remove enough grime - delicately! - from the cave walls and pottery to try and make out what the pictures decorating the space were. Which, well, all seemed to be humans doing incredible feats of magic - raising firey tornados or walls of water, controlling herds of hoofed animals or… you suspected, with an uncomfortable sensation in your chest, some of those humans seemed to be raising the dead. 

Okay, that was too creepy. 

Still, Nat’s enthusiasm hadn’t waned one bit, even through the repetitive and tedious work. The two of you had struck up a true friendship working in these eerie, dark conditions, and you were slowly realizing that Sans was right - you had missed having a human friend. Not that she was _better_ than a monster friend, exactly, just that she got your references, she understood why you were feeling awkward about every single monster you met knowing you were pregnant at a glance… she even knew how weird Capra was. 

It was just nice. 

Carefully, the two of you pick your way down the natural corridors separating chamber from chamber in the cave system, arriving, at last, at a part of the cave you knew you hadn’t been in before yet - you’d seen last time that the next chamber was an enormous, black space with some sort of shape in the center, but you hadn’t gone any further. 

“Here we go…” Natalie says quietly, and the two of you take a step further, shining your headlamps and trying to make sense of what you were seeing. 

This cave was definitely larger than the other two by far - not nearly as big as the cave that held the Palace, of course, but at least the size of a warehouse. In the center of the room, there was a strange shape jutting out from the ground, looking oddly regular in the organic cave space. 

“Is that a stalag...ite?” You say, mumbling over the middle of the word. 

Nat stops and stares at you as you walk forward, her headlamp catching your guilty expression. 

“Do you really not know the difference-”

“Oh shit.” You interrupt, recognizing the shape with a surging feeling of disgust. Natalie stares at you again. “I’ve seen this before.” You mutter, stepping closer. 

It’s a raised slab, a flat, polished piece of white granite that had to have been brought in from elsewhere because none of the stones around here looked like this - it was taller than you and Nat combined, but not very thick or wide. Not that it needed to be. Halfway up on the slab, two iron shackles are built into the stone.

At the base is a trough. 

“We shouldn’t be here. This is a bad place.” You mutter, taking a step back. 

“What is it? Why is it… the inside of those iron circle things, they’re lined with spikes… why would they…” 

You bite your lip, trying to figure out what to say. You’ve seen this device before, in the book - the Badbad Book - when you’d first figured out how other human mages got their access to magic. The shackles were meant to hold a monster into place, yes, but also to cut into magical flesh, to…

Oh god, and the trough. 

“Nat, please. I don’t want to be here. We should go.” You mutter again. Natalie isn’t paying attention. She’s still looking around, trying to make sense of what she’s seeing, and then her headlamp hits a mosaic on the wall, one gory enough to make the scene entirely clear at once. 

“Oh… oh god. Is that a monster? What are they… oh god.” She whispers, then looks at you, wide eyed - half blinding you with her headlamp. “Why-”

“I can tell you, I promise, but this is… let’s go, please.” You say, your skin crawling. “We don’t know enough. We don’t… god only knows…” The cavern is so big, so dark. 

You swear you can feel eyes on you from somewhere in that darkness.

Natalie gulps, but before she agrees, she slings down her camera and clicks one quick, determined picture of that mosaic. Then she turns to you, and you cross the distance to her, for once not worrying about what you might be disturbing with incautious footsteps. You take her hand, tear a doorway open, and you run.

\------------------------------------------

“What… Why would humans… Were they drinking… That’s not real, right?” Natalie blinks, disoriented, in the sunlight on top of Mt. Ebott. You hadn’t known where to go, so you’d panicked. You wince, trying to get your head on straight, trying to convince yourself the last thing you’d seen in that room, before you’d stepped through, that it hadn’t been blood red eyes. 

You’d been assuming that Asgore’s edict against humans exploring those caves was just Asgore being Asgore again. But fuck, no, this was something bigger, and now one more person knew the human mages’ dark secret from long ago. 

“Natalie, I promise, I’ll explain. But… you can’t tell anyone about what was in there, okay? We can’t go back. That-”

“I don’t understand, why-”

“Hang on-” Now that you’re back in an area with reception, your phone is going off, and with a sinking feeling, turning the screen on, you see dozens of missed calls and messages from Undyne. She’s calling again, right now. “Sorry, Nat, I just gotta… Undyne, hey, what’s up?!” You say, turning from the short, distressed girl to answer the call. 

Undyne sounds out of breath and panicked as she responds;

“Cody just called. His little sister and M.K. are missing. Sans went out to look already, I need you to help too.” 

“Oh, god, of course. Shit.” You take a second, just a second, to try to catch your breath. “What do you want me to do?”

“I don’t know!” Undyne sounds distressed. “Sans left me behind and I can’t even-”

“Hang on. We’re coming to get you. We’ll go to Cody’s, start there.” You say firmly, and hang up. Natalie stares at you. 

“W… what?” 

You take a deep, long breath, then say, 

“Um. Wanna… maybe... fight some bad guys?”


	125. Wherein You Ocean's Eleven It Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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“Bad guys? _______, what the hell? What’s even happening right now?” Nat says, bewildered. You sigh, already tracing a doorway home. 

“It’s been quiet for too long. I never really thought that they’d changed their tune, the folks that tried to, you know. Kill me last time?” You say distractedly, then take a breath. “I’m getting ahead of myself. It’s probably just some kids who wandered off. We just need a search party.”

“Okay, but… the mosaic? The humans going all... dracula on the monsters?” Nat attempts, and you nod. 

“I’ll explain. I promise. It’s… bad. But right now, you know, the more people we have looking out for our friend’s sister… ugh, okay, Cody’s a friend, his sister and M.K. - Monster Kid - are both missing, and there’s some of those guys who tried to kill me and kidnapped those monsters, some of them moved in next door to Cody, so…” 

“Oh. Oh god.” Natalie finally processes the concern. “Okay. Let’s go.” 

“You’re sure?” 

“Um, if there’s two little kids missing? Yeah. I’m sure. I mean, again, I can’t do anything in a fight, you know that, right? Like nothing. But I can try to find a little kid!” She says, and leads the way, charging through into your house through the doorway you’d just made. You find yourself smiling tightly as you follow her. 

Undyne’s waiting for you on the other side, knowing that you’ll step into the kitchen and pacing anxiously. “There you are!” She says as Nat steps through, craning her head to see you following your new friend. “Uh, hi, other human.”

“Natalie.” You remind her. “You’ve met.” 

“Right. Sorry. Lessgo. Is she helping?” Undyne nods at Natalie. 

“Of course!” Nat says indignantly, then adds, quickly, “Though, reminder. Robot knees-”

“What?” Undyne interjects, and you sigh.

“She’s gonna help us look around. No fighting, no running. Undyne, where are we going?” 

“Cody’s house.” She says at once. “Cody says the kids were there at 9 AM, all dressed up in little costumes, and then he turned his back for a split second and they were gone-”

“Okay. Okay. Kids do stuff like that. It’s probably fine.” You say, biting your lip. “Can you show me his house on a map?”

You still don’t like cutting doorways if you’re not exactly certain where they’re going to open up. Sans doesn’t like that either, you doing it, at least. You get the sense that he doesn’t particularly love doing it himself, especially after the fight at EbbCo, after you’d been captured and almost killed just because you couldn’t have known what was lurking on the other side. 

This time, however, you open up a door onto a placid country street. You’ve been in this neighborhood before, if not this particular road; the buildings are small, the lots are huge and covered with old growth trees and thick bushes, barring where small lawns have been cut out of the old forest. The houses remind you of Toriel’s; small squat wooden constructions, all at least a hundred years old. It’s never been a particularly wealthy part of Ebott, but it’s nice. Quiet. A place for families.

“This one’s theirs.” Undyne says, nodding at a ranch house to your right. Of course, Undyne’s driven Cody home before, she knows exactly where he lives, you think, though you’re still surprised when an older woman comes rushing out of the house, instantly grabbing Undyne in a hug.

“Oh, thank you for coming.” She murmurs, taking a step back, still grasping Undyne’s hand.

“Of course, Mrs. Parekh.” Undyne says politely, bending a little so she can make eye contact with the short woman. “Any news-”

“Come inside. Quickly.” Cody’s mom (it has to be) urges you all, finally looking at you and Natalie. Her eyes rest on your arm for a moment, clearly curious, but she ushers you in all the same, bustling behind you until you’re inside the small home. 

Indoors, you can hear the low rumbling of your fiance’s voice from around the corner,

“bud, is there anywhere else they normally hang out? do they have bikes, maybe?”

“I told you, it doesn’t matter!” Cody sounds agitated. “I saw the way that creepy dude next door was looking at Asha and her friends when they were building the treehouse! He did something!”

“i know. i know. i just gotta make sure that we have enough to go on to make asgore or the cops do something.” Sans sounds calm enough, but when Mrs. Parekh urges you, with a nod, around the corner, you see how bright his eyes are. He’s agitated, maybe even worried. 

Cody, on the other hand, is a nervous wreck. He’s pacing, his head snapping instantly around when he hears your feet on the linoleum of the kitchen they’re standing in. “Oh, thank… finally.” He says, walking over to wrap Undyne in a hug. Phew, you hadn’t gotten the sense of just how adored Undyne was over here. You should be keeping better tabs on your friends, you think guiltily, and then wince as Natalie shuffles awkwardly. Introductions seem like they have to wait, though; Sans has made his way to your side, and he gives your hand a fleeting touch as you speak up.

“Sorry. We were… out of range.” You mutter. “Cody, what’s-”

“Undyne sent Sans over to help look and we went everywhere that Asha and MK hang out but they were just gone, dude, I swear to god, I went to make them some ants on a log and then I came back out and they were missing and it’s been hours and Asha’s phone is off and Sans visited Frisk and Frisk said MK didn’t have a phone cuz they don’t have hands and now he won’t fucking _do_ anything because he’s worried about the cops even though we all know who has them-” 

“We don’t know that.” Mrs. Parekh interjects. “And you are being very rude to our guest. Cody. Apologize.” Cody looks at her, wilting, then turns back to Sans,

“Sorry dude, I just-” 

“forget it.” Sans advises, giving him a friendly smile. “we all want the same thing. get those kids home safe. hey, nat.” 

“Hey.” Nat squeaks, looking very out of her element indeed now. 

“Can we just go over what happened one more time?” Undyne suggests. “Maybe, uh, just replay what happened this morning before they went missing, Cody?” 

“Yeah, sure.” Cody clearly thinks that you’re all wasting time talking about this, but he clears his throat. “Asha and MK had a sleepover last night. They stayed up all night talking and eating snacks and watching action movies-”

“What?” Mrs. Parekh interjects. “Cody, I told you, no more movies like that for her!”

“Mom.” Cody groans. Mrs. Parekh glares at him for a second longer, then nods. “Then they wanted to play dress up so I dug out Asha’s halloween trunk, and they went outside and Asha asked me to make them breakfast but I dunno how and mom was out shopping so I went to make them ants on a log-”

“What did they dress up as?” To your surprise, Natalie speaks up. Cody blinks at her, dumbfounded.

“Uh… trees. I figured they were putting on a play?” He says. Natalie’s brows raise.

“And do they know that the people next door hate monsters?” She asks. 

“Yeah, that’s why I told her not to wander off!” Cody says, worried. “I can barely stop her from trying to eavesdrop on them from her treefort as it is! Also, sorry, who are you?”

“My friend Natalie. Sorry.” You say, but your head is already spinning. You look at Sans. “They…”

“They spent all night watching action movies and now they went next door to spy on the bad guys.” Natalie finishes the thought for you, having arrived at the conclusion first. “That’s why her phone is off, I bet. They think they’re under cover.” 

“What? My daughter would never…” Mrs. Parekh begins, then grimaces. “Well. Perhaps she would.”

“Man, I am going to kill her!” Cody grumbles, then looks up at you all. “Well? What do we do? How do we get her out of there?”

“i mean, they’ll probably come back on their own. but… i don’t like it. what if we’re wrong? and what if they get caught? we gotta do something.” 

\-------------------------------------------

The plan is simple. Natalie is a distraction, as she agrees to go to the neighbor’s front door and pretend to be missing her cat. You and Sans are the extraction team, since you can make shortcuts and sweep the thick forest separating and behind the neighbor’s house, looking for two small souls belonging to some terribly precocious spies. Undyne and Cody are going to be muscle. Mrs. Parekh is going to be pretending to garden in her own front yard, ready to call the police or make a commotion if something happens to Natalie.

It’s not a perfect plan, and it all hinges on the kids actually being in the neighbor’s yard, but it’s worth a shot. Natalie takes off, her phone already out - she has hundreds of pictures of her own cats on there, she admits guiltily, so she’s already prepared for this eventuality. 

Mrs. Parekh heads out first, watering can in hand. You watch her anxiously from the window, and then cut a doorway to the end of the road for Natalie, so it doesn’t look to anyone watching like she’s coming out of this house. She swallows, looks at all the worried faces around her, then nods, stepping through. You close the door, take a breath, and wait, reaching out to squeeze Sans’ hand. Cody and Undyne have already moved into the side yard, ready to charge through the woods if necessary, but… discretion is key. 

Finally Mrs. Parekh turns to the window and inclines her head - Natalie has rung the neighbor’s doorbell. Quick as you can, both you and Sans cut different doorways, each on different sides of the thick woods in the back of the neighbor’s house, in view of their backyard, and you step through, immediately dimming your vision, looking for souls and trying to stay as inconspicuous is possible. 

You and Sans move as quietly as possible, but that’s still noisy on the dry leaf cover - you hear a stick crack and some rustling that you’re sure isn’t you, but there’s nothing you can do about it. Find the kids and get out of the crazy racists’ backyard. Forget that these people tried to murder you. 

In the end, you almost trip over them . Asha and MK have holed up, trembling, in the middle of a huge rhododendron bush right at the border of the back lawn. Their disguises are - well - adorable, but not quite good enough to be not noticeable from the house, you think. It takes a second for them both to recognize you where you think, panicked, that they’re going to scream, but then both of their faces relax when they see your arm. 

Sans joins you a second later, just as you’re tracing a doorway to get them home. He actually _does_ sneak up on you: you realize a second later that he’s floating slightly to avoid crunching any more, a bead of sweat forming on his brow at the exertion. Gravity magic. That was a gift you’d never gotten the hang of. 

You hustle MK through the doorway, and are just about to nudge Asha after him when she grabs your sleeve, yanking you down. You look to her, then to Sans and see that he’s already fallen into a crouch, his expression fixed through the bush concealing you into the neighbors’ back yard.

“It’s really a shame about her cat.” A pleasant, female voice says. You crane your neck, inching your gaze over to the backyard you’re trying so desperately to stay out of sight from. The back door to the ranch house of the suspect neighbors has opened, and two figures are walking out. 

“Well, we got her number. We’ll keep an eye out, if we find it. If those freaks next door don’t eat it first.” A male voice replies.

“Honey!” The woman says, scandalized. 

“Oh, come on. Not the humans, I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not a racist. I was talking about their daughter’s mongrel friends, is all. Wouldn’t surprise me if they ate cats. Fuggin’ disgusting. I ever catch those little shits over here, I swear to fucking christ...”

“Pierce, you promised me you’d stop with this. We got caught up with some insane stuff last year, but we… baby, we need to put this behind us! For both of us! We still don’t know how we’ll be tried, when they hear our case, but… god, we can’t be acting like that anymore. What if someone heard!? It wasn’t like us to be using guns and, god, kidnapping monsters? I’m a teacher! You’re a chef! You’ve got to just leave this thing alone!”

Hah. You glance, out of the corners of your eyes, at Sans, and see - to your relief - that he’s now very very slowly floating Asha through the doorway you’d opened, getting her to safety without drawing attention. Asha, thank god, doesn’t squirm or complain, even though it must be a very strange experience.

“It doesn’t matter.” The man groans, his voice getting a little quieter. “The monsters are going to be gone soon anyway, one way or another, the way Lenny hears it from the big boss, he says something really big is coming soon-”

“WHAT?” The woman bellows, almost enough to make you jump. “Pierce. You’re not meeting with them again! You told me you weren’t going to talk to those guys anymore!” 

“Look, you’ve made your viewpoint clear. Here’s mine. I’ve got to do what’s right for you and our baby. I’m not going to have her grow up in a world where those things can use magic to hurt her and she doesn’t have a say. I’m going to do what’s right-”

“You’re going to leave her without a father!” The woman says irritably. “Inside. We need to have a talk.”

“But I need to start the grill-”

“It. Can. Wait.” She says venomously. There’s a pause, and then the sound of a door opening and shutting. You wait for a long moment, then lock eyes with Sans. He hesitates, then inclines his head slightly, and you make a break for it; a second later you, Sans, and two huge eyed little children are all in the safety of the Parekh’s living room. 

“We spied good.” Asha whispers defiantly, after a long moment of silence. “They want to hurt the monsters.”

“kid. i don’t even know you, but if you _ever_ pull something like that again, i’ll make it my personal mission to make sure you’re grounded until you’re, uh, 40.” Sans mutters, and when both Asha and MK look at him, distraught, he sighs. “yeah. you spied good. never again, though. c’mon, let’s go get your mom and brother, they’re worried sick.”

Great. Well, you’d found the kids, but now something big was coming. 

And there was a spooky ghost kid and a flower monster that had gone to seed and Natalie had found out about the blood thing and Gaster was out and you were having a baby that was totally unprecedented and you didn’t have a birthplan and there was a wedding and…

“I need a vacation.” You mutter to yourself, taking Sans’ hand as you follow Asha and MK outside.


	126. Wherein Some Tiny Trees Get In Trouble

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> 
> [ See you at stream intermittantly tonight!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“What the he….ck were you thinking, Asha!” Cody erupts again, managing to slide into slightly more PG language when his mother glares at him. Asha scuffs her foot, glaring defiantly up at her brother. She and MK are still dressed like tiny trees, which adds a level of unintentional comedy to the whole situation that you’re pretty sure you’re not allowed to mention. “I told you a thousand times, you stay away from that house! They’re not good people!”

“I know!” Asha protests, pint-size fury in her eyes. “The guy said something big was coming! That the monsters will be gone soon-”

“I don’t care what he said!” Cody bellows. 

“...Uh. I kinda do.” Undyne says quietly, and Cody whirls on her for a second, then sees the look on her face and sighs, the anger flowing out of him. 

Your motley assemblage has moved from the side yard into the safety of the Parekh’s living room, and you’re sipping a sweet iced tea that Cody’s mom had pressed into your hands almost as soon as you’d sat next to Sans. She stands next to Cody, ready to swat at him if he slips up and swears (which he’s already done twice), but otherwise looking quite relieved that her daughter and MK are safe. She’s already hugged you and Sans twice, and looks like she wants nothing more than to scold Asha for a while and then fall asleep. 

“We’ll talk about it.” You tell Undyne, and Natalie, by Undyne’s side, clears her throat. 

“We’ve got kind of a lot to talk about.” She reminds you. “Spooky cave? Evil humans? Et cetera?”

“...What?” Cody blinks up at her, and you grimace. Natalie is like a dog with a bone when it comes to things she doesn’t understand and feels that she needs to. Clearly, your warning to keep the whole mural thing on the downlow hadn’t sunk past the part of her brain that needed to know what she’d seen.

Cody is still studying her determined face, looking curious. Suddenly, his expression shifts. “Hey. I know you. You were in my Math 101 class.” Nat gives him a scathing look. 

“Yeah. I know. Your frat brothers made oinking sounds at me whenever I ate my breakfast in class.” Cody cringes at that, and again, Mrs. Parekh swats the back of his head, looking slightly outraged.

“Ouch! Oh man. I’m uh. I’m sorry. I was a pledge. I didn’t… I wanted them to stop, I’m sorry.” He says slightly pathetically. Asha, at the side of his chair, gives him a big, gloating smile - it’s better when her brother’s the one in trouble. 

“It’s fine.” Natalie says dryly, then blinks when MK clears their throat. “Hey, you okay, sweetie?” 

MK looks up and their eyes, you now see, are big and watery. “Um. C-can I go home? I know I made a mistake.” They mumble, and you feel a stab of shame, realizing that you’d totally missed the poor little dude’s distress. 

“Of course. I will take you.” Mrs. Parekh says in a no-nonsense fashion.

“I’m coming too.” Asha announces, and everyone turns to look at the little tree. “It was my idea. I’m going to tell their parents that it was my fault. MK didn’t want to.” She says, clearly thinking that she’s being very brave and noble right now. Mrs. Parekh studies her for a long moment, then sighs, clucking her tongue. 

“Fine. But you should consider this trip the last one you’ll be making to a friend’s house for a very long time.” Distractedly, she pulls the leafy headdress and fake bark wrapping off of first MK, then her daughter. She sighs once more, then looks back at you, Sans, Nat and Undyne. “Thank you. Again.”

“course.” Sans says with a small smile. “we’re not big fans of letting kids get in danger around here.” No, you think, feeling his gaze move to the Dot just for a second, he certainly is not. 

After Mrs. Parekh and the kids leave, you stand up slowly. “Well. We should get going. We have to taste wedding cakes, remember-”

“Wait.” Natalie interrupts. “There was a bigass mural of humans drinking a monster’s blood down in that cave-”

“What?!” Cody interjects again, looking alarmed. 

“-and I was promised some answers. You know more about it, you said so.” Nat persists stubbornly. Undyne and Sans both look at you, and you groan. 

“I’m… really not supposed to talk about it.” You mutter, seeing Natalie’s mouth draw into a firm, straight line. 

“Oh, come on. It’s just Cody and Nat.” Undyne says dryly. “My best human bro and your new human bestie. Er. Your ONLY human friend. Who’s a girl, anyway. ” 

“Undynnnnne…” You hadn’t exactly told Nat how hard up you were for human companionship, and you can feel your cheeks begin to heat up. Sans snorts, but then he nudges your shoulder, folding his fingers through yours. 

“‘s a human secret. lots of humans seem to know about it already, though.” He points out, and Undyne scoffs again. 

“Yeah, the bad guys!” She rolls her eyes, then turns to Nat and Cody. “You heard something big went down at EbbCo. Monsters got kidnapped and stuff. That’s why. They wanted their blood. To, um, eat it. Or, er, drink it. They put my wife in a cage because they were going to use her as a snack, even. They thought that that was the only way humans could use magic.” She says, neatly taking the decision out of your hands.

Natalie and Cody mull this over for a second, and then-

“Oh my god!”

“Bro, I think I’m gonna puke, that really… ugh.” Cody looks greenish gray, and he does look, for a moment, like he thinks he’s going to be sick. He stares into the middle distance, but Natalie’s eyes are already moving between you and Sans. 

“But, um, that’s not the only way for humans to get magic, right?” She begins tentatively, and Sans, who’d been looking quite seriously at Undyne, displeased that she’d just spilled the secret, loses his scowl and begins to snicker as you blush even deeper, feeling quite horrified. 

“nah. we’ve learned about a few other ways.” He says lazily, and Undyne coughs on her own glass of iced tea, choking enough to be a thankful distraction. While Cody lurches out of his disgusted stupor to pound her on the back, your alarm goes off, and you look at Sans. 

“Shit. We really need to go to the cake thing.” You mutter. 

“Cake thing?!” Undyne wants to know, looking eager. “We eating cake?” 

“Er… we are. Well… probably just me. Sans not so much a cake fan.” You mutter, then glance at him again. “I suppose we could use a second opinion?” You offer, giving your fiance an out. He brightens at that. 

“yeah undyne, come with us!” He says, then remembers Nat and Cody. “uh, you guys could probably come too?”

“Hah, you sure? Cody looks like he’s about to toss his cookies still. Hey, Cody!” Undyne taunts. “What if she picked out a red velvet cake with ooooozy raspberry fill- OUCH!” She rubs her shoulder as Cody smacks her - going a little green again, and then, unkindly, narrows her eyes, giving her friend a smile that shows every sharp tooth. “Come on, though. Come with and you’ll get to teleport-”

“it’s not teleporting.” 

“-and it’ll be your guys first date.” She says, looking between Nat and Cody, waggling her eyebrows.

“Undyne.” Natalie whimpers. “Why.” 

“Bro.” Cody mutters, with a tone of absolute and total betrayal. 

“No, I’ve got a good feeling about this. I know my shit. I realized that these two belonged together back in November-” She nods at you and Sans, “And now look at them, knocked up and living in sin and trying desperately to get their shotgun wedding together! Don’t you see?!” She asks the two humans delightedly. “That could be you!” And with that, she slings an arm of camaraderie around each of their shoulders, and nods at you. “To the cake shop, nerd!”   
\-----------------------------------------

The cake shop is, to put it lightly, a fucking disaster. The smiling girl behind the counter loses her smile almost instantly when she sees Sans, then Undyne, then your arm. 

“Oh.” She says, sounding much less pleasant than she had on the phone. “I’m afraid there’s been a miscommunication. We don’t cater for, er, _monster_ weddings.” 

You stare at her for a second, feeling… well, blindsided. Then hurt. And then a moment that you suspect might be pregnant hormonal rage that you aren’t going to get to try twenty-four types of cake. 

“Yo. That’s messed up.” Cody announces in the silence - he’s clearly still feeling a little punchy after getting Asha back. “These are good people! What the dick, dude?” You glance at Sans, and see the flicker of fury in his eyes, then sigh. 

“Forget it.” You look up at the lady, then drawl, “I mean, we were probably going to have to spend a few thousand on cakes, but… hey, you know what? We can probably get the queen to make it for free anyway, right babe? Probably taste better than the garbage from this place too.” Sans folds his fingers through yours, and he snorts. 

“yeah. wouldn’t want to eat anything you assholes make. shame you’ll be missing out on all that _dough_.” He plays along. Natalie, surprised, snorts out a laugh at both the unexpected pun and the look on the woman’s face. 

“Think you got a _rise_ out of her.” She says quietly, and Sans turns to grin at her, looking quite pleased. Oh no. 

“nothing like _pudding_ a bigot in her place.” He remarks. That’s enough. 

“That one isn’t even cake. Let’s go home.” You tell him, and he snickers again, gives the girl behind the counter one last huge, insolent grin, and then traces a doorway right in the middle of the shop. She lets out a startled yelp of surprise, and Sans shrugs. 

“dunno _why_ you’d wanna be an ass to people who just wanna get married. your prerogative. later.” He remarks, stepping through the portal into nothingness. 

“I bet Lawyerpants would be interested in this.” Undyne sneers, as she too walks through. Cody balks at the doorway only for a minute, then steps through with a mumble that sounds a lot like “asshole.” Natalie just arches her eyebrows, then follows him, and at last, it’s just you and the woman at the counter. 

“...You’re a legitimately bad person and you should feel bad.” You say, shrug, and then step through back into your kitchen. 

“cool insult, babe.” Sans snickers, but then he sees the look on your face and sighs. “you gonna be ok?”

“Yeah.” You insist at once, hyper-aware of your audience. “I just… we’ve got a lot of people that we need to work with to get this done. If they all go like that...”

“We’ve got your back, nerd.” Undyne insists. “We’ll make this wedding happen. Right?” 

“Right.” Natalie says at once. Cody blinks, then shrugs. 

“Yeah, bruh.” 

That makes you feel a little better, seeing this tangible reminder that not everyone is tilted against you or the man you love or your unborn kid, but you’re still feeling a little down, all the same. Sans notices. 

“babe, what’s wrong? what can i do?” He asks quietly, and you hesitate, then admit, 

“I’m so hungry. I was gonna eat so much cake…” 

Everyone laughs at that - except Sans, who already has his phone out and is furiously texting… Toriel, you assume. 

“Oh jeez, babe, don’t, I was just-” 

“too late. cake’s comin’. your cousin too. rest of the day’s gonna be better, promise.” He insists, and leaps into action, guiding everyone into the family room, picking out a show on Netflix, calling in Papyrus and Alphys and LD, popping popcorn. By the time that Mettaton and Capra walk in from wherever they’d been, around dinner time, the mood is much improved, Frisk is on your lap, and you’ve eaten a sufficient amount of magical cake to make you never want to eat cake again. Well. Maybe take a day or two off of cake eating, at least. 

Capra stares at this contented scene, and you can tell, for a second, that he wants to make some very dry, sarcastic, quip about monogamy or family or wholesomeness or… any of the things Capra normally jokes about, but then he shrugs and flops down in the recliner. Mettaton stares at him, then echoes his shrug and slides neatly onto his lap. You wince, thinking that Capra’s leg is going to be broken once again, but Mettaton must be lighter than you’d thought, because Capra doesn’t look perturbed. Well, a little perturbed, but eventually he relaxes, and then turns back to the (quietly observing) group. 

“Hey gang. What happened today? Oh, hey Natalie.” He fixes his cold blue gaze on you. “Good. You made a friend.” He says, sounding pleased.

They’re both pretty horrified by the story about the cake store, and Mettaton squares his chin, looking seriously at you. 

“Well. That won’t happen at your dress appointment tomorrow.” He says firmly, his eye flashing. “I’m coming with you.” 

“...Oh. I’m not.” Capra says with a snort. “Sans. Sans. Scotch and golf? Ehhhh?”

Capra is such a good friend.


	127. Wherein You Have A Montage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [if you don't follow my tumblr you missed platonic skeleton prom](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“Mettaton, I swear to god, no.” You begin, coming downstairs the next morning to a rather unpleasant greeting in the foyer. You’d been hoping for Nat and Undyne to be all ready to go to the dress appointment, not… “Sorry, who are you?” You say, clearing your throat awkwardly and looking at the man with the giant video camera standing next to Mettaton. He raises his brows slightly. 

“Part of your production crew.”

“Part of my - oh my god, dude, I can not. With this, I can not.” You grumble. You’re not in the best mood, thanks to how you’d started the morning; the smell of eggs and coffee, normally enough to get you out of bed and moving, had this morning, sent you scrambling to the toilet, hand clapped over your mouth. 

(Your fiance was not coping well with _that_ , by the way.) 

“Darling, don’t be ridiculous. You’ll want these memories later. What will you show to your child when they ask how you got your dress?”

“Nothing!” You groan. “Literally no kid has ever asked their parent that. Besides. If you want some proof, cell phone pictures are fine. Uh, sorry…” You add, realizing you’re being quite rude to the camera guy. He shrugs, unperturbed. 

“But precious. If this goes well, it could be a marvelously successful pilot-”

“NO.” You snap. “You are not making me into a reality show bridezilla, Mettaton. Now, where are Natalie and Undyne and Alphys?” Mettaton pouts at you for a long, exasperating moment, then sighs. 

“In the car. Darling, are you absolutely _certain_ that you won’t let just, oh, one or two cameras stay? The memories-”

“No.” You’re quieter, but this time, Mettaton understands that you’re deadly serious. He sighs, long and dramatic, and then turns to the cameraman. 

“She’s pregnant, you know. I hear humans often have dramatic fluctuations in mood-”

“ _Mettaton._ ” Your tone is absolutely venomous. He grumbles, then sighs. 

“I’m afraid your services won’t be needed today after all, darling.”

“Uh, I’m still getting paid, though, right?” The camera guy begins. “I mean, we made an appointment, and….” 

You grow distracted from the bickering over price between your friend and the cameraman when you hear Sans shuffling down the stairs, looking sleepy and still a little worried. 

“you sure you’re feelin’ up to going?” He immediately starts in. “didja eat?” Your stomach lurches at the thought, and he can see the answer clearly on your face. “you gotta eat.” He begins, and then groans as you grin, knowing what’s going through your head. “i know. i know. rich coming from me.” He says. “still, though. food is, uh… good for you.”

“I’m fine. I’m going. And I’ve got a granola bar in my bag.” You insist. “This is pretty normal for humans. I’m lucky it’s only just starting now.”

“i’m sorry.” He grumbles. “‘s not fair that you gotta feel sick just because…” He rubs an eyesocket, then gives you a sheepish, adorable smile, moving over to wrap his arms around you in a quick hug. “have fun gettin’ your dress?” He says, and you laugh.

“I’ll do my best. Have fun playing golf with Capra.” You say, giving him a crooked grin. 

“i’ll do my best.” He says, very, very dryly. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

He had no idea. No _fucking_ idea. Why would he have thought that Sans would understand something as sacred, as sacrosanct as tee time? Why would he have assumed that Sans could be anywhere on time, but especially anywhere that required you to be there early!?

He scowls, rubbing his eye, then turns to the country club’s attendant, hovering by the side of his golf cart. “Bud. You’d better go get me a… what’s a morning drink? A bloody mary I guess? Get me two of those, please?” The attendant, who’d been surveying the first green with a supremely bored expression on his face, perks right up. 

“Oh! Is your friend going to be here soon?”

Shit. He hadn’t thought of that. 

“Good point. Make it three.” Capra drawls, and then saunters back to the golf cart, grabbing his phone off the tacky vinyl seat. “Hey. Intern.” He says, shaking his caddy to attention. The kid sits up straight, pretending that he hadn’t been dozing off. “You drink?” 

“Um. Yes. Sir. I think. I mean. Yes.” The kid says. Capra snorts, and stares after the retreating attendant. Should he call the guy back and put in another drink order?

...Oh, hell. He could share. That’s what Mettaton was always stressing, right, empathy? And, uh, not making an ass of one’s self? Fine. He didn’t need two bloody marys, not really. “Good.” He says jovially. “Got you a bloody mary. It’s good for the, uh, circulation? Whatever. I’m lying. I’m gonna fucking kill that skeleton, I swear to god.” 

“Um. Sir? Why didn’t you just, um, bring him… with you? I mean, you’re in the same house and everything?” The intern squeaks. Capra feels his eyes widen, and he turns his full attention to the kid. What’s his name, Dave? 

“Is that what people are saying?” He asks slowly, and the intern cringes, actually ducking his head. “No, no, come on, don’t worry, just… people know that, huh? What are they saying?”

“Er. Um.” The intern stumbles over his words and Capra winces. “Just that. Um. Um. You. And. Your. Um.”

“cap, everyone knows you’re shacked up with mettaton. in my house. for some reason.” 

“FUCK!” Capra yelps, his heart pounding. Sans. Sans, the beautiful little shit, is not just standing there, no, he’s taken the time to teleport and assemble himself so he’s just casually sitting on the bench seat of the golf cart, like he’s always been there. “CAN YOU NOT?!” 

“uh. obviously i’m gonna do that. if it makes you do that, i’m clearly gonna do that. ‘sup, dave.” Sans drawls, and oh god, that shit, that fucking… that glorious asshole, he doesn’t even turn around, he just holds his hand out for a drink as the attendant returns with a tray. He doesn’t even look. Capra stares at him as the intern squeaks out a hello, and he has that feeling that is equal parts jealousy, astonishment and affection. 

“You know,” He begins.

\--------------------------------------------------------------

“You’re my best friend.” Undyne says. You roll your eyes. Alphys clears her throat. “You’re my best friend that I’m not married to.” She corrects, and Natalie giggles. “I’m begging you. You can’t wear that tiara. It’s the worst.” 

“BUT IT HAS SO MANY SPARKLES!” You insist.

Mettaton makes a quiet noise of deep, terrible despair. 

Okay, so you don’t really want the tiara. It is actually the worst. But it’s worth it, to see that look on Mettaton’s face. The woman who owns the bridal store is also trying so, so hard to sell you on it too, and that’s kind of hilarious.  
“You’ll look just like a princess!” She exclaims. “Oh, doesn’t she look just like a princess?” 

“She looks like she stole the pope’s hat and vajazzled it.” Nat says dryly. Mettaton shoots her a look of absolute adoration for that, especially when you look in the mirror and lose it, bursting out laughing. She’s not wrong. 

“Fine. Fine. I won’t wear the world’s tallest tiara.” You snicker. “But… okay. So. In all honestly. I really, really don’t know what I’m doing. I know this. I’m gonna be showing, so I need a dress that has room for two. Other than that, I’m lost. I don’t know bridal designers. I don’t know… anything. So-”

“Leave it to me, darling. That’s what I’m here for. You just sit on those couches with the ladies and relax.” Mettaton asserts himself, and beams at the sales lady. She beams back, that starstruck look in her eyes that everyone gets when they’re exposed to Mettaton. He disperses charisma like a chemistry set from the 50’s leaks radiation. “Now, I have some sketches,” He begins, pulling up a display on his arm. You watch him for a second, then spot the pastries on the table and hear your stomach growl. 

“Oh, I need to eat all of those.” You mutter, and decide to trust Mettaton in his dress selection. Undyne laughs as you flop down on a couch and begin to devour a danish, and nudges Alphys and Nat to join you. 

“Oh! Are these your, um, bridesmaids?” Another saleswoman has approached you, her eyes wide, smile wider. 

“Yup.” You say, around a mouthful of lemon curd. “Or. Er. Fuck. Nat-”

“Please. I’m a bridesmaid. You asked me to the dress fitting. That’s bridesmaid stuff. Also, we regularly commit felonies together.” She says, plucking a chocolate croissant from the tray. You burst out laughing at that, but after a second, you say, 

“Uh, really though? Do you? Um. Want to be-”

“Yes please.” Nat says, taking an equally enormous bite of her croissant. 

“P-perfect.” Alphys says quietly. “N-now if Sans makes C-c-cody a groomsman, you two c-can, um-”

“Sweetie! The plan!” Undyne hisses, cutting her off. Nat looks at both of them, then says, slowly, 

“I… you guys know I’m already seeing someone, right?” 

Undyne and Alphys look personally insulted by this news.  
“Who?” You ask, when the awkwardness drags on for an uncomfortable amount of time. 

“Oh you don’t… wait. Actually, you do know him!” She says happily. “It’s um, Shadow? You know? From-”

“Ohhh. OHHHH. The kitty cat.” You say, delighted. “I like him! He’s nice! He’s… hot!” 

“Is that a surprise?!” Natalie laughs, waggling her eyebrows. “Also, er, don’t call him a kitty cat. He doesn’t like that.” 

“Shadow? The cat from… oh, man, last time I saw him he was just a kitten, you guys are dating?!” Undyne bellows, then shrugs and looks at her wife. “Hey. At least he’s cute. And a monster.” 

“A-and catboys are fun to d-draw.” Alphys agrees. Natalie gives you a concerned look at that, but before you can explain about the whole…. manga thing, Mettaton and the first sales lady have returned with what looks like all the white tulle on earth. 

“Come, darling. Let’s try these on!” He urges. You look at the voluminous skirt of the first one and hesitate, then grit your teeth. 

“Okay. I suppose that’s what I’m here for.” You mutter, and get to your feet. Mettaton hands you the first dress and you step into the dressing room. There’s no mirror in here, but there’s a big one out in the showroom, so you get the full effect at the same time as your friends, you suppose. Wrestling your way into the first dress, you wish that there was SOMETHING to look at, some way to ensure you’re doing this right? Eventually, feeling like the byproduct of the Sugarplum Fairy and a Hostess Snowball’s unholy union, you walk back out to face your waiting friends.

“Oh,” Says Mettaton. 

“It’s….” Nat begins.

\---------------------------------------------------------

“Terrible.” Capra spits. “Like. Bud. You’re actually the worst.” 

“rules don’t say no magic.” 

“BECAUSE THE RULES WERE MADE IN LIKE, SCOTLAND, LIKE, TWENTY-THOUSAND YEARS AGO!”

“you’re making a scene, cap.” Sans takes a slow, infuriating sip of his bloody mary, then looks don at it. “hey, weren’t we gonna drink scotch?”

Capra nearly explodes. How could this idiot be beating him by nearly ten strokes!? “Because.” He says patiently. “You can’t drink scotch until after noon. Now stop distracting me.” He holds his breath, squints his eyes, and then taps the ball gently. 

“uh, cap?” 

He’s going to lose his damn mind. 

“wasn’t that ball supposed to go in the hole?” Sans says slowly. 

“Not. All of us. Cheat. With. Goddamn. Gravity. Magic.” Capra says tightly, and taps the ball again. At last, at long last, it sinks home, and he crouches to retrieve it, then stands up, relieved. “Fuck it. I don’t care. All the rules have gone out the goddamn window. I’m getting a scotch.” 

“thought, you know, not before noon-”

“Sans, you tiny piece of shit, do you want one or not.” 

“...yes please” Sans laughs, and climbs up into the golf cart, smiling to himself, as Capra puts the order in with the attendant. The kid, the intern, looks at both of them like he can’t believe he’s lucky enough to be in such company, which melts Capra’s temper a little. 

“Make it three. Fuck it. Just bring the bottle.” He decides, then turns to Sans. “Uh. Your fiancee. She’s gonna be cool with you-”

“yeah. she told me last night that i should take my chances to get liquored up with the boys because pretty soon it was gonna be responsible dad diaper zone for me.” Sans says lazily. Capra thinks that over, looking at Sans. Sans doesn’t seem upset about it. In fact, he seems downright thrilled, once you get past that practiced look of lazy distraction on his face. 

“You’re really excited, huh.” Capra can’t help but marvel. Sans looks at him and shrugs, but again, there’s that excitement in his eyes. 

“yeah. i love kids. love her. i’m the luckiest monster on earth.” He says, and, ugh, gross. He means it. 

“Well… uh. Good. I mean. ‘S not for me. Thank christ. But I’m happy you’re happy.” He says, as earnest as he can be. “How’s she feeling? I mean, I know this is kinda scary for you guys. First human-slash-monster baby or whatever. Everything okay so far?” 

“uh. yeah. i think. she got sick this morning, but she says that’s normal, so… pete, that’s normal, right?” He has to laugh, Sans sounds so concerned. 

“Uh, yeah. One of my stepmoms hurled her entire pregnancy, you’re probably getting off light.” He says with a shrug, beginning to navigate the golf cart to the next hole. Sans stares at him, and for a long moment, he can’t for the life of him figure out why. 

“you… got a sibling?” Sans begins, and Capra groans, rolling his eyes. 

“Half-sister. She’s eleven. I dunno. I try not to deal with that side of my family. Or. Actually. Any side of my family.” 

“why’s that?”

“My family....” He starts.

\----------------------------------------

“It sucks. Mettaton. It sucks.” You protest. “I look like… not like Cinderella. Like her carriage. I look like a poofy white pumpkin someone enchanted into a bride.” 

“But it’s-”

“I don’t care what designer it is, it looks terrible!” You laugh. 

“But your… you know…. you said that you’ll be showing-”

“I’m not gonna hide my baby under all the ruffles on earth. Oh. God. Ruffles. I could eat some Ruffles. Do we have -” 

“Focus.” Mettaton sighs. “Fine. There’s one more.” 

Unlike every other dress he’s handed you, this one isn’t almost a perfect orb of ruffles, feathers and sequins. It’s simple. Lacy. Classic.

“Oh, thank god.” You say, carefully taking the hanger from him and ducking back into the changing room. It takes you nearly fifteen minutes to get out of the last monstrosity and into…

Oh my god this one has secret pockets. 

You come bouncing out, smiling and exclaiming, “Undyne! Alphys! Nat! Pockets!” 

There’s a second of silence where everyone just stares at you, and then Undyne slowly raises her phone, snapping a picture. Natalie’s smile begins to grow wider and wider, and Alphys sniffs, staring at you even as she brushes a tear from her eye. You look over where the mirror is set up, then look back at Mettaton. He’s got both hands clasped in front of him, and he’s looking quite emotional. 

“Good?” You ask quietly. 

“Look.” He says, for once, a little lost for words. You grit your teeth and then walk forward, ready for a disaster. 

It’s beautiful. This dress… it was made for you. You look at yourself in the mirror for a long moment, conscious of everyone taking pictures, and you unconsciously raise your hand to your stomach. There’s room in here for the Dot. It…

“Oh, Mettaton. You guys. It’s beautiful.” You sigh. 

“You’re beautiful, nerd.” Undyne drawls, though she looks quite emotional as well. 

“You have to get it.” Natalie says at once.

“S-seriously.” Alphys agrees. 

“...I might have to get it.” You say, looking at yourself again, then lock eyes with the saleswoman in the mirror. “Uh, how much is this one?” 

She tells you.  
\-------------------------------------------

“holy shit.” 

“Told you, my dad’s a dick.” Capra snorts. 

“well, uh, welcome to the club.” Sans sighs. “but… holy shit. your mom died and he married a new lady-”

“One. Week. Later.” Capra says, and Sans shakes his head. 

“that sucks.”

“Hey. Mine didn’t try to kill me.” Capra says with a shrug. “Think you’re still winning.” 

“uh. mine did try to kill you, though.” 

“Oh. Right.” 

There’s an awkward moment of silence, and then Capra drives his ball. It’s a decent shot, for once, right down the fairway. They watch it in silence, then Sans says, 

“well. you know. you got a family with us, right?” 

Capra opens his mouth to sneer, to ridicule, and then, again, that terrible thing happens. He second guesses himself. He hesitates, then he closes his mouth quickly, before he can say the bad thing, and he thinks. 

Oh, god, it’s the worst. 

“I know.” He finally says. “I know I’m lucky to have friends like you guys.” 

“family.” Sans says again, and Capra pauses, then nods. 

“Family.” 

\-------------------------------------------------------------

You’re beginning to worry when Sans and Capra aren’t home yet - it’s almost four, so they’ve been out for hours! You’re thinking you’ll go find them when you hear the familiar sounds of someone (this time, Papyrus) getting startled by a doorway getting cut into the kitchen. Bouncing to your feet, you’re happy to see your fiance and friend looking quite cheerful (and at least a little tipsy) as they emerge from the hallway. Sans makes a beeline for you, and you barely have time to notice Mettaton doing the same for Capra before he pulls you into an enthusiastic kiss that leaves you giggling. 

“hey babe. you find a dress?” He finally asks. 

“...Yup.” You say quietly. 

“uh oh. what’s the catch.” Sans catches on instantly. 

“It’s the cost of a small house.” 

“oh. ‘s that all? cap! help us out with a dress!” Sans demands. You think back to how you’d first found him, that terrible slum he’d been living in with Papyrus, and you almost have to laugh. 

“How much?” Capra calls back, nudging his boyfriend away.

“Oh. Don’t worry. I took care of it.” You assure them both. 

“Cool.” Capra says, already tugging Mettaton somewhere else. 

“how?” Sans is less easily distracted. 

“Uh. I might be appearing in the pilot of Mettaton’s new wedding show.” You admit sheepishly. 

Sans stares at you for a long, long moment, then bursts out laughing and kisses you again, and with a fiance this in love with you, it’s actually worth it, being on reality tv. 

Probably.


	128. Wherein You Talk With An Old Friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [TST is boy crazy](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> Did you read chapter one of [THE CAPRA DATING SIM???](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7815811)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Tipsy Sans is funny. It’s nice when he’s so relaxed, and he definitely jokes more - you’ve found that your fiance makes jokes with intolerable frequency either when he’s not at all worried, or when he’s so stressed out that it seems to be the only kind of coping mechanism he can muster up. This, fortunately, is a case of the former, and it means that you hear every wedding dress joke that you could possibly imagine, all while he’s got an obnoxiously wide smile on his face. 

He’s had a good day with Capra, you can tell. He likes teasing the guy, of course, but you suspect part of it was that he genuinely enjoyed Capra’s company. And, well, when Sans was with Capra, nobody treated him like shit. Nobody at Cap’s country club would have dared to look twice at him, not when his friend was one of the richest and most influential people in town. 

It’s good. It’s just… good, to see him happy, and to hear him relay all the different ways he’d managed to cheat throughout the day. Amazingly, it had only been magic twice:

“think i might actually be good at golf. the real kind, not miniature. doesn’t that just suck _balls_?” He groans, and you burst out laughing. 

“Okay, that’s a lazy pun. You can do better.”

“‘m i _driving_ you crazy? you’re so good, _putting_ up with me.” He rattles off, his browbones raising the way they do when he thinks he’s done something particularly clever. You clap very quietly - golf claps - and then settle back against him on the couch. 

“I’m glad you had a good day.” You say, resting your head on his shoulder. 

“me too. i mean, about you.” He laughs. “so when can i see this dress?”

“Wedding day.” You yawn. “It’s bad luck otherwise.” He snorts, then seems to realize you’re serious. 

“that’s a thing?”

“Human tradition, I suppose.” You say drowsily. 

“i’m gonna peek.” He threatens. 

“Don’t you dare. You be good!” You laugh, and he chuckles again. 

“fine, fine.” A comfortable minute passes, him slowly rubbing the back of your neck, and then he mutters, “it’s really happening. we’re really getting married.” He sounds so pleased with this, so disbelieving, that you have to lift your head to smile at him properly. 

“Yup. And we’re having a baby.” You remind him. 

He doesn’t say anything else, just beams at you, then pulls you back in, giving your temple a quick kiss.

\-----------------------------------------------

The following morning is less idyllic. 

“Oh, god, I’m supposed to already be at work.” You inform the inside of the toilet bowl. 

“my head hurtssss.” Your hungover fiance whines next to you, still dutifully trying to keep your hair out of the way. “what’s even in scotch? why did i have all of it? on earth? why did i drink every - oh, man. sorry.” The thought of scotch is making you gag again; you grab your stomach instinctively and close your eyes, breathing steadily - in through your nose, out through your mouth. Slowly, the nausea subsides. 

“you’re _sure_ this is normal?” Sans asks for the thousandth time.

“Pluh. Yes.” You say, reaching for the toothpaste, still clutching your stomach. “I’m good, babe, you’re off hair duty.”

He relents, but stares at you even as you brush your teeth, rubbing his jaw distractedly. Finally, he clears his throat. 

“call out this morning. we’re gonna find you a doctor.” 

“Sans, I swear, it’s fine-”

“ok. but. how far along are you?” You bite your lip, realizing he’s been doing his research. 

“Ten weeks or so. Er. This is technically eleven.” 

“internet says you’re supposed to go to the doctor at ten.” He says sternly. 

“To make sure the baby’s still doing okay.” You insist. “Look at. It’s doing fine. Don’t be a butt.” He rolls his eyes, but does glance down at the Dot. 

“soul’s getting a shape, i think.” He notes, and he can’t keep the tone of wonder out of his voice, even now when he’s trying to be stern. You smile at him, looking at your reflection in the bathroom mirror. 

“Yeah. I think you’re right. It’s not just a dot anymore. I think. Still too small to really tell, but…”

“know who could probably tell us what’s going on, though?” He’s undeterrable. “a doctor. like you’re supposed to.”

“Fineeeee.” You groan. “Just… you know. Be prepared. They might say something you don’t want to hear.”

His eyes flash concern. “something i don’t want to hear like what?!”

\------------------------------------

“I’m sorry.” The young doctor says, twisting her engagement ring anxiously on her hand. “I just can’t help you.”

“i don’t understand.” Sans’ tone is fake nice, as if this doctor is going to give a different answer than the last three you’ve talked to this morning. 

“I’m licensed to treat human patients. Not… uh…” She stumbles, staring at your stomach for a second, then your arm, then back up at you. “I’m so sorry. I really am. But I could lose my insurance.” 

You exhale slowly through your teeth. “Yeah.” You mutter. “That’s… what I thought.”

“it’s ridiculous. i thought human doctors were supposed to help people!” Sans grumbles.

“Could you… er. Could you go to a monster doctor?” She tries, and Sans glares at her again. 

“monster pregnancies are different.” He says flatly. She gathers her resolve, and meets his eyes. 

“Exactly.” She says, her voice stronger. “I have no idea what I could be treating, but I know this, it’s nothing that I studied for, and I just don’t know enough to be sure I’m doing the right thing!”

“Do you have… any idea of where we could go?” You ask, after another long pause. 

“There’s a government funded research lab at the University. I could make some calls. Although-”

“yeah, let’s let the human government get their hands on the half-monster kid.” Sans says dryly. “we’ll skip. and you’d better not tell anyone about this-”

“She can’t.” You say clearly, making sure to meet the doctor’s eyes. “There’s laws. She’d get in huge trouble if she talked about any of my medical information without my consent.” 

The doctor swallows. “Right.” 

Sans pauses, then takes your hand, the irritation clear on his face. “well. thanks for nothin’. c’mon, babe.” Pushing the exam room door open, he leads you out, through the waiting room full of humans with intrigued looks on their faces. 

“You know,” You remind him outside. “It’s not a secret from other humans that I’m pregnant. Mettaton’s little fanclub let that one out.” 

“yeah.” He grimaces. “but. we haven’t rubbed anyone’s noses in it yet either. seems like the government’s staying out of our hair, or, uh, lack thereof, but that’s no reason to bring attention to our… situation.” 

“Yeah.” You agree with a sigh, then grimace. “But babe. I think we’re out of options. Well. Not entirely. We’ve got the one-”

“absolutely not.” He attempts to nip your obvious proposal clean in the bud.

“Gaster.” You push on, trying to mitigate the cringe he makes upon hearing the name with a squeeze of his hand. “He’s said he’s willing to help, and he’s got the machines, and, um, clearly some level of expertise-”

“we have no idea what he did to make me. or paps. but i know this, he is getting nowhere near our kid, no matter what.” Sans’ tone of voice nearly shocks you. You’ve only heard him this serious once or twice before, most notably… well, in the cavern, where his dad had nearly killed both of you. 

Okay. He’s got a good point. 

“I know. You’re right.” You agree after a moment. “But… this is what I was afraid of, babe. We’re out of options. Nobody’s going to provide medical services to a mystery baby, or even a human with a magic arm. We’re shit out of luck.” He nods glumly, squeezing your hand back in return, but then his eyes spark back into life as something occurs to him. 

“wait.” He says. “i have an idea.” 

\----------------------------------------------------------

“Okay, this is just degrading.” You tell him, sitting in the awfully familiar chair in the waiting room and feeling an overwhelming sense of deja vu. 

“what?” He cracks a smile. “it was good enough for l.d., wasn’t it?”

“Okay, yes, but he’s a… he’s a dog, dude!” You hiss. 

“dog _monster_.” He reminds you, and you groan quietly. “besides. he’s the only person we know who might actually be useful.” 

“He’s still a vet.” You grumble, staring around the room and trying not to get too frustrated by this.

“Oh! Um. Mr. Sans and …” The new receptionist, an awkward looking blonde guy, fumbles for a second when he realizes the two of you don’t have a pet with you. “Er. Right. Um. He’ll see you now? Exam room four?” 

At least Cadence isn’t here to be disgusted by the thought of Sans hitting on you this time. Maybe things have improved a little over the course of the last few months. You give the waiting room one last frustrated look, and then you stand up, and the two of you walk into the exam room together. 

Dr. Stanley is waiting for you - well, for Sans - with that same look of stern intelligence in his dark eyes. He does something of a double-take when the two of you walk in together, however, and he takes a moment to hide his confusion, stroking his gray mustache distractedly. 

“Sans. ________. This is something of a surprise!” He admits, holding his hand out to shake. Sans does so first - he always appreciates it when humans show that they’re not squeamish about shaking his hand - and the doctor smiles at him, but again, he’s more than a little thrown when you follow suit and his fingers touch bone once more, rather than the, er, human hand he’d expected. “Goodness.” He says, blinking rapidly, then looks back and forth between the two of you. 

“i, uh, take it you don’t watch the news. or the tabloids anyway, huh, doc?” Sans says dryly. 

“Er. No.” Dr. Stanley confesses. He looks between the two of you once more, his brow furrowing. “But wait. Why are the two of you here, without… Oh. _______, is Ghost…”

“Oh, jeez, no! Sorry, he’s alive, he’s fine, he went down to the beach and caught a minnow this morning I had to clean up!” You sputter, feeling a little touched that Dr. Stanley was so concerned for your elderly cat. 

“A cat of that age-”

“Shouldn’t go outside, yeah, I know, Sans’ brother just keeps sneaking him out…” Again, that look of confusion crosses Dr. Stanley’s face, and then he sits down on the opposite side of the exam table from you and Sans. 

“I think, perhaps, I should let you explain everything.” He says after a moment. 

You glance at Sans. No way are you explaining _this_ particular awkward tale on your own. No. Way. He gives you an affectionate smile, finding your hand again, and steps up to the plate. 

He explains everything. 

Oh, there’s a lot of cringing on your behalf all the same. A lot-lot. It’s bad enough having this stern, elderly man know that you’d fallen in love with a guy that you’d met in his waiting room, let alone that you’d moved in with him and, well, had unprotected sex (with some soul stuff). Especially when the vet had pointed out that the last time the two of you had visited him hadn’t even been a year ago. 

(“Well, we’re getting married.” You’d offered weakly, as if that somehow would negate your, er, premarital indiscretions.)

“anyway. doc. nobody else will help her. at all. we just need to know… you know. our kid’s ok. she’s ok. that’s it.” Sans finally concludes, and you know him well enough to recognize the tone of slight desparation in his voice. 

Dr. Stanley can hear it too. He looks at you over his glasses, eyes moving between each of you in turn. 

“If I did what you proposed, I could almost certainly lose my license. Perhaps suffer further sanctions. I am truly not supposed to treat humans.” He says slowly. You clear your throat, feeling dejected. Right. Of course. Well.. maybe it would have to come down to Gaster. 

Sans doesn’t snap this time. He simply bows his head, looking tired. “right. figured. well… thanks for listening, doc.” He turns to reach for the door, when Dr. Stanley speaks up again. 

“Wait.”

Sans pauses. 

“I am… a man of principles.” Dr. Stanley says, after the quiet begins to hang uncomfortably. “And it seems to me that letting you go without the care you need would be in direct violation of those principals. However-” He begins, and makes sure both of you are paying very close attention. “The care I can provide is rudimentary. My expertise in human anatomy is similarly rudimentary. I will do my best to research and ensure I am as up to date as I can be, in this area. If I find that there is something that is clearly beyond my expertise, I will endeavor to find assistance from one of my trusted friends or colleagues, with your permission.” He takes a breath. 

“I understand that this is not what you wanted.” He says, after a moment. “It is far from ideal, and the implication that Monsters,” (that’s how he says it, you can practically hear the capitalization) “are of the same order of intelligence and therefore deserving of the same level of care as household pets is… offensive, to say the least. I have treated Monsters here before because there is no other place to go, and life on the surface has proven to present threats to them that require my services. I will treat you for the same reason - not because I think that my care is nearly sufficient, but because I understand myself to be your only recourse.”

You can only nod dumbly. 

“Now.” The vet clears his throat. “I’m sure you’re anxious to get a first look at that baby. To be perfectly honest, so am I. If you’d follow me…” He opens the door that leads further back into the facility and nods at the two of you. 

You and Sans exchange a glance, and follow. 

\----------------------------------------------

Twenty minutes later, you are lying on a exam table that’s certainly held a lot more dogs and cats than humans. Your stomach is covered in cold goop. And none of that matters. 

“that’s our baby?” Sans checks quietly again, like he hasn’t just asked that question. 

“That is your baby.” Dr. Stanley confirms patiently. 

It doesn’t look like much. It’s tiny - well, you knew that already. But-

“It’s got a heartbeat.” You say softly. 

“it’s got a heart.” Sans chuckles, though his throat sounds tight - a hard thing to pull off when he doesn’t have one. He squeezes your hand, then looks at the vet. “does it look… normal? like a human baby?” He asks. 

“Quite normal.” Dr. Stanley says, sounding mystified. “Based on what I recall. Textbook, even.” 

“Huh. Wonder how you pulled that one off?” You say dryly, but you can’t tear your eyes away from the screen to look at Sans. He lets out a quiet, bewildered laugh. 

“...magic?” He says, but his heart isn’t in it. He’s too busy looking at your child.

“Fascinating.” The vet mutters. 

Still, later that afternoon, when you get home and Sans, clearly feeling much better, is busily making you lunch, you wander away to find Ghost. He’s in Papyrus’ room, as usual, dozing in a sunbeam on Papyrus’ pillow. He looks up, making a sleepy purr when you sink down next to him to give him an extra thorough chin scratch. After all, you’ve got a lot to apologize for. Now that you’ve been through it yourself, you think that he might have had a point about being irritated to go to the vet.

Then again… 

There _was_ a photo of the Dot on the fridge now. And that made up for an awful lot of indignity.


	129. Wherein You Do Important and Informed Baby Analysis

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [TST is a cream faced business boy](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“That’s a picture of your baby?” Undyne demands, squinting at the refrigerator suspiciously. She’s still decked out in her work uniform, but for once, she doesn’t have Cody tailing her like a lost duckling - which she might be a little put out by. He was, after all, her best bro.

“Yeah.” You say, and take another bite of pizza. “That’s it. In all its glory.” Undyne studies the picture for a long moment, which you watch, feeling amused, from your perch on the stool at the kitchen island. Sans, next to you, seems less amused. 

“you got a problem with it?” He wants to know. Undyne rolls a large yellow eye at him. 

“No. It just… clearly didn’t get any human bits. But! Hey! That’s fine! You guys are having a goop monster!” She says, picking up momentum again. “No, actually, that’s super cool, it’ll be able to drip under doorways and stuff-”

“Ish not goop monshter.” You say through your pizza, and Sans chuckles and pats your back. 

“slow.” He reminds you, like he does every time you flip the switch from queasy to starving and react, well, accordingly. You make a grotesque face at him - the pizza in your mouth helps - and then swallow and try again. 

“It’s _not_ a goop monster. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” You add quickly, when Undyne’s eyebrows raise and you can just _see_ some sarcastic quip forming on her tongue. “But the doctor… yeah, sure, we’ll call him the doctor, he said that it looked like a normal human baby at ten weeks.” 

“So.” Undyne says, unimpressed. “Normal human babies are just like, piles of goop? Do they have like a pupal stage or something?”

“nah.” Sans tells her, before you can. “i know. i looked it up. undyne. it’s got a heart already. like humans do.” He’s particularly proud about that bit, he’s mentioned it a few times today already. “it’s got arms and legs an’ a head and-”

“ _Where,_ though!?” Undyne demands, squinting at the sonogram. “This is just squiggles! Are you sure this isn’t the like, tv channel Papyrus keeps calling a blizzard documentary?” You snicker, shaking your head. 

“It’s not static. Just… Give it time.” You tell her with a shrug. 

“I want it to be here already! I want a kid to goof around with and be a cool aunt to! I wanna teach it how to suplex and go surfing and fight villains!” She complains. “How much longer does that thing need to cook?!”

“if it keeps actin’ like a human baby, we’ll meet it in march. by my math, probably the 16th or 17th are most statistically likely. just based on, uh… you know. when it showed up. also, you know, it’ll be an infant that can’t do any of that stuff.” Of course Sans knows this. Sans probably has a secret organized day planner that has every possible piece of information about developing fetuses. He needs that control, you know that, so you don’t tease him for it. Besides, it’s kind of nice. You haven’t been doing half the research he’s been doing. 

“March?!” Undyne looks aghast. “Not even before Christmas? Man, I can make like two babies before that even happens!” 

Your eyebrows raise involuntarily, and Undyne thinks about this, then blushes. 

“you gonna have kids anytime soon, undyne?” Sans sees this weak point, and, as he just can’t help himself from doing, jumps on it. You nudge him with your foot, concealed behind the kitchen island, but he simply continues looking entertained. 

“No.” Undyne sounds a little sullen. “I mean. Well. It’s taking…”

“What’s wrong, bud?” You ask when she trails off, craning around Sans for another piece of pizza. He nudges the box closer to you, and then picks a piece of pepperoni right off the slice that you’d chosen, munching on it insolently, a wide grin on his face. He’s in a pranking mood - which is to say, a good mood - and he clearly thinks he’s cracked some sort of code, because he’s managed to find a way to not get yelled at for stealing the hungry pregnant lady’s favorite topping; you weren’t about to scold him for eating, even if he chose a super annoying way to do so. Still, you get distracted by this tiny battle, and you get caught off guard when Undyne blurts out;

“Alphys says no because it’s not safe.”

This makes you freeze, pizza halfway to your mouth. Out of the periphery of your vision, you notice a bony hand creeping in to steal another pepperoni from it in slow motion, and you distractedly smack it away. While Sans snickers, you repeat,

“Not safe?” 

“Yeah.” Undyne heaves a sigh. “I thought we were getting somewhere about it. I mean. Can’t blame her for being spooked, after she got kidnapped. I’m… I mean, nothing scares me,” She lies smoothly, “but I was spooked too, after what happened under EbbCo. But… things seemed to be getting better. We were talking about it. But then. You know. The Cody thing. What you guys overheard from the MIB. Something big is coming.” She rubs her eye, now looking a little downtrodden. “She says she doesn’t want to bring our kids into a world like this. And she’s just been spending so much time in her lab at the University, but I’m not allowed to know what she’s even doing because it has to be secret and… ugh.” She slumps. 

You abandon your pizza for Sans - maybe he’ll even eat it - and hop off the stool, crossing over to hug her. “I know things seem bad.” You sigh into her shoulder (which is about where your head reaches). “We’re a family, though. We’ll get through it. Things can’t be this bad forever. They’ve got to get better, you know? They just have to.”

“want me to talk to her?” Sans asks Undyne, plucking another pepperoni from your pizza.

“No! No. I’ll figure it out.” Undyne insists, then seems to remember herself. “Look at you getting all sentimental, nerd!” She says, wriggling free from your hug, but her heart isn’t in it. She looks at you again, then glances at the fridge again, looking at the sonogram with an expression that might be … wistful? Then she perks up, hearing the sound of the garage door opening, down the hall from the kitchen. “Paps is home! I hope he brought groceries, you’re gonna eat that whole pizza yourself and the rest of us need food!” She says, and tears off down the hall, spirits apparently restored, before you can even think of a proper comeback. 

“Rude.” You finally grumble, pacing back to sit next to your (annoyingly entertained) fiance, and spitefully snatch the remnants of your pizza back. “Oh, man, Sans, did you have to eat literally every pepperoni off of mine? Why not just get your own piece!?”

“funnier.” He says with a shrug.

“You have to finish the rest of that piece now. That one’s yours.” You say sternly, and he groans, then nods, realizing that he got himself into this mess. 

“i’m just glad you wanna eat again. babe, i will be so glad when you don’t feel sick anymore.” 

“Me. Too. It’s only been two days and that is enough. I would also be fine with my boobs no longer hurting or fitting weird in my bras or doing that thing where they go over the top of my bra like a loaf of bread rising or…” You trail off on your full litany of boob related complaints as Papyrus makes his entrance known. 

“BROTHER! HUMAN! I HAVE RETURNED FROM ANOTHER LONG DAY OF FLOWERS!” He says happily.

(“And he didn’t get groceries. Be back later, nerds, I’m gonna go get takeout.” Undyne grumbles behind him.)

“hey, bro!” Sans bounces up, and you hide a smile behind your hand. He’s so excited. “c’mere, look, it’s a pic of your niece or nephew!” He urges, practically dragging Papyrus to the fridge. Papyrus stares at the picture for a long moment. 

“CONGRATULATIONS!” He says brightly. “IT’S HIDEOUS!”

“that’s not how it’s gonna….” Sans begins, and gives up when he hears you laughing hysterically. “fine. our baby’s hideous. yuk it up. how was work, bro?” 

Papyrus’ normally open expression clouds at this question, and he looks down at Sans, appearing… hesitant. It’s a weird thing to see on Papyrus’ face. 

“SANS, I HAVE A QUESTION.” He begins, after a moment. “YOU SAID OUR DAD WAS VERY, VERY, VERY BAD, RIGHT?”

Uh oh. Your stomach plummets - ugh, suddenly this pizza isn’t feeling so good. Sans looks up at Papyrus, clearly thinking. 

“yeah. he tried to kill me. and _______. and capra. he’s bad. he’s really bad.” He says, slow and calm. 

“THEN WHY WOULD ASGORE ALLOW HIM OUT OF JAIL?” Papyrus asks quietly. “HE DOESN’T SEEM SO BAD…”

“paps.” Sans is very still now. “what happened?” Papyrus looks at him and gulps, then stammers,

“I - I WAS JUST DOING MY JOB, AND WHEN I FINISHED TRIMMING THE ROSEBUSHES, HE WAS STANDING NEXT TO ME. I SCREAMED VERY LOUDLY! FOR A LONG TIME! BUT HE JUST STOOD THERE. WHEN I RAN OUT OF SCREAMS, HE SAID HE WASN’T GOING TO HURT ME.”

“sonofabitch.” Sans is very quiet. 

“HE SAID THAT HE WANTED TO AP-POLOGIZE. FOR BEING A BAD DAD. AND… THAT HE WANTED TO FIX THINGS. AND NOT TO TELL YOU THAT HE TALKED TO ME BECAUSE YOU WOULD BE VERY VERY MAD AT ME.” Papyrus says, quiet too (for Papyrus). “AND HE WAS RIGHT. YOU ARE-”

“i’m not mad at you, bro.” Sans makes sure to say. “i’m mad at him. i told him to leave you alone.”

“SANS. HE SEEMED SO NICE?”

“yeah, paps, but that happens to you, doesn’t it?” Sans sounds exasperated now. “people act nice and then they hurt you! don’t you remember, underground, how…” He trails off, his expression troubled. You recognize that expression, of course. He’s bumping up against one of those things he can’t quite remember, one of those things he’s not sure even happened in this timeline. 

“PEOPLE CHANGE, THOUGH. PEOPLE ARE GOOD. HE WANTS TO BE MY DAD AGAIN.” Papyrus sounds a little stubborn now.

“he’s a murderer! there’s no coming back from that!” Sans snaps, but then, once more, his expression clouds - you see his hand twitch, just once, a muscle memory (well, not muscle). You wonder what he’s reaching for, in his mind. It doesn’t really matter. You stand up and move to his side, looking up at Papyrus as well. 

“Sans is right, Paps. Gaster might have changed, or he might not have, but… you don’t need to be around him. He doesn’t get to have you back just because he might have had a change of heart.” You say, and once again, find yourself making this entreaty. “You’ve got a family here. With us. You don’t need him. You never did.”

“WHAT IF… WHAT IF I WANT TO SEE HIM THOUGH?” Papyrus whisper-screams. “WHAT IF I JUST WANT TO KNOW?” 

“paps. bro. you gotta trust me.” Sans says. “don’t.” 

Papyrus looks down at Sans, and you’re exposed, once again, to that glimmer of immense calculation behind Papyrus’ eyes.

People often assume that Papyrus isn’t particularly smart. People are wrong. 

“I TRUST YOU.” He finally says, and just like that, the moment is over. “DID YOU GET ME ZITI PIZZA?” 

“mac n’ cheese.” Sans says, nodding at the unopened box, a look of obvious relief on his face. When Papyrus turns to get himself a plate, Sans shoots you a desperate look, and then nuzzles into your neck, seeking reassurance for a split second. You sigh, then hold him tight, just for a moment. 

He’s going to be a great dad. He’s had lots of practice. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------

By the time he gets home, with groceries, it seems like everyone has either eaten half their weight in pizza or indian food. The debris is all over the kitchen, evidence of a house full of hungry monsters and one pregnant chick. Well then. 

“Guess nobody cares about keeping their New Years resolution to eat healthily.” He grumbles. 

“literally nobody made that but you.” 

“Gah!” He hadn’t noticed Sans in the corner of the room - it sounds like everyone else has moved to the family room for the usual shenanigans. “Can you-”

“hey cap look at my baby.” Sans interrupts the predicted complaint. Ah. So that’s why Sans had been lurking in the deserted kitchen. Well, that and almost certainly because he wanted to scare Capra. 

“Christ, is it already that far along? You have a picture?” He says, feeling out of sorts, and hauls a grocery bag over to the fridge, studying the sonogram. “When’s that thing coming out, anyway?”

“uh, march. statistically it’s probably the-”

“MARCH!?” Capra hears himself yelp. “Holy shit, that’s soon. That’s practically tomorrow. That’s… two and a half financial quarters away!”

“heh.” Sans seems privately amused by something. Though… oh, Capra doesn’t like the way that worry seems to cling to his friend these days. Him or you, really. Expectant parents were supposed to be happy, right? So often, the two of you just looked… 

Tired. 

Well. He can try to make things more normal. He squints at the picture on the fridge.

“Cool baby.” He finally decides. “Looks like a peanut thing. Oh. Man, is there a chance you’re having a peanut monster? What if it’s allergic to itself? We should-”

“how does nobody but me know what human babies look like?” Sans sounds exasperated. “‘s not a peanut baby.”

“Well, it’s not an all human baby either. I mean, it’s half you. It’s _gonna_ look like a goon.” Capra snorts, then surveys the empty takeout containers on the counter again, swinging open the fridge to unload the bag he’s carrying. “So. Looks like I’m on my own for dinner tonight, huh.” 

“what?” Sans says, surprised, then snorts. “no, idiot. your _boyfriend_ saved you a plate. it’s in the other room. go get food. i’ll put this away.” 

“Oh.” He processes this, and something awfully warm and embarrassing twists in his chest for a moment, like some sort of… affection eel. Ugh. “Cool. Thanks.” He says, then looks pointedly at Sans. “There’s vegetables in that bag. I know you’ve never seen one before, but they go in the crisper, okay, you don’t just throw them out or put glitter on them or something-”

“shuddup. i’ve had vegetables before.” Sans grumbles, and Capra, snickering, walks down the hall to the family room, feeling like he’s gotten the upper hand. 

“Oh! You’re finally home! I saved you some food, Peter. I had to fight Alphys off of the tandoori chicken-”

“U-uncalled for!”

“but I think I saved most of your favorites.” Mettaton says cheerfully, patting the spot next to him on the couch. He’s sitting next to you, and seems to be fairly focused on you for some reason, but when Capra walks over and sits down next to him, he tears himself away to nod at a plate on the coffee table and give him a quick peck on the lips.

The affection eel twists again.

“Thanks, Threep.” Capra says quietly, and picks up his plate. He’s not _used_ to this! This nice shit. He’s not used to someone who isn’t a personal assistant remembering his favorite takeout dishes. It’s…

“Capra’s blushing.” Undyne says loudly. 

He scowls, and deliberately extends his middle finger with the hand that’s not holding a drumstick. Mettaton just looks fondly at him for a moment, then turns back to you.

“Anyway, darling. We’ll set it up with a runway show. No. Three runway shows. Seventeen dresses. Five point lighting. Background music… I think we can get Gaga, but we’ll need to act quickly.”

“Mettaton, I thought this was going to be a small, one day shoot thing. That was the deal.” You whimper, then look up with big doe eyes as Sans walks into the room and makes a beeline for you. He squeezes himself into the tiny space left on the couch, and you curl closer to him. 

Sometimes, he feels like that might be an okay thing to do. To curl closer to someone. 

“Darling, you’ve _got_ the potential! It would be such a waste! Just try!” Mettaton urges. Undyne sucks in a laugh through sharp teeth, and Papyrus nods agreement. Alphys tries to speak up, but Mettaton seems to sense this - his head spins with unnatural smoothness and he stares at her until she settles back down next to Undyne.

You look so tired, though. Sans looks tired, and you look tired and… 

“Mettaton,” He begins, somewhat surprised that he’s doing this. Mettaton turns to him at once, his full attention focused on him, which is probably fair… he can’t think of the last time he’d used the guy’s real name. “Don’t you think…” He phrases this carefully. “Maybe the kind thing to do would be… uh, to let her off the hook?” He asks. “They’ve… got a lot going on, you know?” 

He expects a look of betrayal from Mettaton, or at least a sarcastic glare. He’s surprised by the softness on his… his boyfriend’s face. 

“And isn’t it like you, to do the kind thing…” Mettaton muses quietly, and brushes a piece of Capra’s hair back into place before nodding. “Fine. Consider it dropped.” 

“Just like that?!” You sound hugely skeptical, and Capra rankles slightly - Mettaton had said he’d do it so he’d do it! Mettaton doesn’t care, though. He just shrugs, and looks back at Capra. 

“I trust him.” He says.


	130. Wherein You Hit A Bump

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man oh man. Just checking in with an update. The update is I love you. 
> 
> [You read this far, now live the cobc experience](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

The Dot seems to spend the next week and a half throwing all of its heart and energy into growing. 

You can tell, at first, because the spark of green marking its soul - was it still an it? was it enough of a person now that you could dare to think of it as a ‘they?’ - anyway, its soul was blossoming, growing bigger by the day. There was no way to miss it now. If you could see souls, you could see this thing, this tiny cartoon heart distinguishing itself further, day by day. 

It isn’t until Thursday of week, what, this was twelve now, you suppose, that you see other evidence of your child’s progress. Hauling yourself out of bed at 6:15 in the morning, you prepare for the what now feels like usual stab of nausea. For once, thank god, it doesn’t arrive. You simply stand up, process this, and let out a relieved yawn.

“you ‘k?” Sans mumbles into his pillow. “need help?” 

“No. No, I’m actually good for once, babe. Go back to sleep.” 

“goooood.” He yawns, and pulls the covers up, almost to the top of his head, drifting off almost immediately. You take a second to look at him fondly, watching the covers rise and fall slightly with his steady breaths, and then move to the armoire to get dressed. Oh, thank god you’d finally caved and bought bigger bras, you think, picking out a particularly comfy one. Sans hadn’t seemed to mind this particular change one bit, you had to notice. You yank on your uniform shirt, and then grab your loyal khakis. 

They won’t button. 

For a second you’re just frustrated - yeah, you’ve been putting on some pregnancy weight already, sure; the constant pizza cravings sure hadn’t helped. Did you even have bigger uniform pants? 

Then, staring down, you recognize at last the slight swell of your belly, the one that hadn’t been there before.

Oh. 

You let out a quiet, giddy laugh, and Sans stirs again.

“puttin’ on your funny pants?” He demands, peeking an eyesocket over the blankets. Normally you’d banter right back, but right now you’re feeling a warm rush of… something. Something you’d never felt before. Something very strong and entirely new and absolutely joyful. 

“Sans. Look.” You say, flinging open the curtains so the sunlight outside will shine on you, still wearing your unbuttoned pants and walking awkwardly as you do so in an effort to keep them kind of on, at least. He yawns, rubs an eyesocket, and sits up. 

“soul’s even bigger this morning. i know. i’m gonna have to say that every… oh.” He finally takes in what you’re pointing out. For a moment he’s still, clearly thinking, his eyes bright, mind busy. “c’mere?” He finally asks, patting the edge of the bed. 

You waddle over, trying to keep your pants up, which normally would be enough to have him shaking with laughter, but now…

“look at you.” He says, his voice quiet and reverent. “look at…” 

As you sit down, he reaches out slowly, bones touching your midsection like he’s done what feels like a thousand times before. But this time… oh, this time there is a slight arc to his trailing path, a distinct, noticeable… bump.

“They’re actually in there.” You say out loud, feeling dumb even before the thought is complete. “I mean. Obviously, they were, but I can see… I mean, we saw their soul. We saw the sonogram, but…”

“no. this is different.” Sans says quietly, and then he finally smiles at you, a big, huge, enormous smile that is nothing but joy, and in spite of everything, in spite of the normal sardonic expression, the sharp teeth, the way that he just doesn’t seem to be _built_ to allow so much joy on his face… oh, it radiates from him. And if his face is joyful, oh, his soul…

You don’t think you’ve ever seen it so bright. 

You sigh happily, content, and then lean up and kiss him, lips soft against his. He holds you close, his hand tracing over that tiny bump once, twice, and keeps staring into your eyes even once you’ve pulled away. Oh, you’re already running late for work, you know that but… fuck it, you’ll just teleport into your office, it’ll be fine. It’s not like Barb will be breathing down your neck for this one, right, since she was on the Board of Directors now and didn’t have to micromanage the day to day… oh, you’re distracted, and he’s kissing you again, and you feel like champagne, like your whole body is filled with tiny fizzing bubbles. 

“you’re so beautiful.” He murmurs, and for once, you let yourself enjoy this, you let yourself forget about the wolves at the door, the threats that would only continue to multiply, and you stay in the moment.

You end up being almost an hour late to work. 

It’s totally worth it. 

\---------------------------------------------

By noon, though, reality has sunk in. You’ve borrowed a pair of uniform pants from general supplies when you’d arrived, and it had started your mind down an overwhelming train of Things That Need To Get Done.

You’re not alone in this regard. Your phone’s been going off all morning.

sans: you probably gotta get more clothes right?  
sans: dot’s just gonna keep growing.  
sans: oh god they’re gonna need clothes too  
sans: and a crib  
sans: and a room  
sans: and a high chair  
sans: and toys? probably?  
sans: diapers.  
sans: oh god. a college fund?  
sans: tiny shoes  
sans: shit a stroller they will need that right  
sans: ...a rattle?  
sans: probably not a rattle  
sans: what food are they even going to eat?  
sans: we have no idea!  
sans: should we get every type of food?  
sans: i mean when paps was a baby he ate mostly hot dogs and spaghetti  
sans: but.  
sans: it’ll be march they’ll need a tiny coat oh no do they even sell those  
sans: what do humans put babies in!?

You can see the indicator showing that he’s typing again, so the second it’s acceptable for you to leave, you take mercy and cut a doorway to the lab he’s been working in, on the second floor of EbbCo.

“Ah, shit!” A coworker - Kenji - yelps, when you startle him by stepping through. Shadow, the cat monster, looks unperturbed. 

“Thank god you’re here.” He says with a purring laugh. “He’s freaking out.” He nods at the corner of the room, where your fiance is standing up from, attempting desperately to make it look like he hadn’t just been in the middle of a panic attack.

“hey.”

“Hey.” You say with a small laugh, and lean forward to kiss his forehead. “Stop worrying. It’ll be fine. Hey, you know what? Meet me after work, we’ll go to the baby furniture store together. You’ll feel a little better once we’ve got their room ready.”

He looks up at you, then groans and grabs you tight in a hug, clinging for a long moment. 

“thank you.” He mutters. 

“It’s gonna be okay.” You whisper. “We got this. We can do this.”

“yeah.” He sounds a little more confident now. “we can do this.” 

\-----------------------------

You end up having to stay later at work than Sans - a goddamn kid threw a goddamn handful of change into the goddamn piranha exhibit right at closing and you have to stay and supervise the cleanup efforts, privately thinking to yourself that if the Dot ever pulled this kind of shit, they would be grounded for all of eternity. 

At least Cody and Undyne both volunteer to stay late. Undyne changes into her swimsuit and slides into the water with the milling fish, which is definitely not procedure, but hey, it’s the fastest way to get it done. She patiently seeks out pennies and dimes from the gravel at the bottom while the piranhas nuzzle up to her like affectionate kittens, emerging occasionally to give Cody a few coins. This means, of course, that you and Cody are free to make awkward small talk. 

“So, uh, is Asha still grounded?” You ask. Cody laughs tiredly. 

“Until she’s thirty.” He says, then clears his throat. “So. Uh. You’re looking. Uh. Pregnant.”

“...Thanks.” You mutter sarcastically, folding your hands self-consciously over your stomach. Cody grimaces, then tries again. 

“Uh. So I was wondering. Do you think you might be cool with, uh, giving me… your friend Natalie’s, um, digits? Because… I would like them?” He says, scuffing a shoe in the gravel on the side of the exhibit. 

(A muffled sound of bubbling laughter can be heard from the tank.)

“Um. She’s seeing someone. Cat monster. Nice guy.” You say, and his face falls. 

“Oh. Right. Sure.”

“But I mean, if you want to be um, pals, she’d probably, uh-”

“hey.” You spin, relieved, hearing Sans’ voice. Oh thank god. This could not get any more awkward. 

“Hey baby.” You say, moving to his side as he looks around the Amazon room with interest.

“long time since i’ve been here.” He says, and then twitches slightly as Undyne emerges from the tank again with a sloppy splash. “hey bud, didn’t see you there. sup?”

“You guys can go. I think that’s all the coins. And me and Cody know how to check the PH and stuff.” Undyne says, wringing out her ponytail. 

“Oh, I should really…” You say halfheartedly, your mind already full of thoughts about cribs and paint and what room you should be stowing this kid away in.

“Go.” She urges with a laugh. “You’re planning a wedding and a kid. I got this. Oh, while I’m thinking of it, can Cody come to the wedding?”

“sure?” Sans says with a shrug, while Cody glares bloody murder at Undyne. 

“Toldja. Sorry your date plan isn’t gonna work out though.” She teases him, and then turns to glare at you. “Go! Why are you still here!” 

Laughing, you take Sans’ hand, and walk out of the Amazon room. “Let’s walk. I haven’t been outside all day, and the furniture store’s only a few blocks away.” You urge. 

He smiles fondly at you. “sure. lessgo.” 

Outside, the heat of the day is just beginning to ease off, and when a breeze blows, you sigh happily. “Autumn’s coming. I can smell it.”

“never had it underground. loved it last year. all those leaves.” Sans says happily, swinging your hand. “will they still be around at the end of october?”

“Yeah. It’ll be a really nice view from Mt. Ebott.” You assure him, then grin. “Our wedding pictures will be rad.” 

“good.” He squeezes your hand again, diverting you through a small park on the way to your goal. You take the moment to breathe in the air, enjoying the feeling of the dappled sun on your skin, the motion of small creatures in the trees, the sound of sprinklers on the small baseball diamond on one side of the path, the knowledge that your fiance is excited for your baby and to marry you and that you’re going to be so happy-

“Disgusting.” You start with surprise - the park isn’t very big, and you’d thought it was deserted, but the deep male voice suggests otherwise. You spin to find the source, dropping Sans’ hand; he’s already doing the same, taking a slight step in front of you. 

The park is not actually deserted. There’s three men coming out of a dugout adjacent to the baseball diamond, wearing uniforms that suggest a company’s recreational team and clutching beers, and by the way that they’re moving, they’ve been drinking all day.

“you got a problem, bud?” Sans’ voice is hard. The man slightly in front of the other two, the one who’d spoken, ignores him, looking at you. 

“You’d fuck something like that. You’re dishgusting.” He slurs. “Traitor.”

“She’s pregnant!” One of the men behind him suddenly cackles. “Look, bro, look at her! She’s pregnant with-”

“I know. Saw online. ‘S girl with the arm.” The leader slurs, taking another step forward. The baseball bat in his hand trails against the pavement of the path behind him with a metallic scrape. 

“wouldn’t do that, bud.” Sans is cold and quiet, now. “why don’t you go sit back down.”

“Sans.” You warn quietly. He can’t just attack these drunk dudes, after all. They hadn’t done anything, yet. 

“You can’t want that thing inside you.” The leader speaks again, still ignoring Sans. “‘S an abomination. You gotta get it out.” A disgusting jeer crosses his face, and then he hefts the bat, closing one eye and taking a practice swing, slow motion, right at the height of your belly, still several feet away. He’s imagining hitting you, though, that’s for certain. He’s imagining hitting the Dot so hard that you..

Your best intentions and levelheadedness immediately curdle. You’re reaching for something, your brain only struggling with whether you call up a spear or Spot, and you see simultaneously a glint in Sans’ eye, and you’re already seeing ahead to a future in jail or worse when yet another voice cuts through the sounds of birds and sprinklers;

“Gentlemen. Leave them alone.” A voice says distinctly. “I have already called the police.” It’s hard to tear your attention from the three drunk assholes, but you turn halfway, the surprise stopping you from doing something stupid. 

The speaker is Dennis Smith, your awkward neighbor, a pair of binoculars around his neck, a birding journal in one hand, an ancient looking flip phone in the other. You blink. 

The drunks look surprised too. The leader seems about to argue, to harass you _and_ Dennis, but the one who hasn’t spoken yet, who seems less drunk, pipes up;

“Fuck this, man. Not worth getting harassed by the cops. I’m out.” He turns on his heel and walks in the opposite direction. After a second, the one who’d noticed you were pregnant turns with a snort and follows his friend, and then there’s only the leader. He stands there for a long moment, then spits on the ground near your feet and retreats as well. 

You glance at Sans. He looks too tight with anger to say anything, still, so you’re the one to turn to Dennis. 

“Um. Thanks. You probably shouldn’t… just… you could have gotten hurt. It’s better to let us handle this kind of stuff? But. Thank you.” You add quickly. He gives you a tired smile, brushing a piece of long hair back behind his ear. 

“Christmas night, I allowed you to handle it on your own. There were men who crossed my property to try to hurt you and I did nothing.” He says softly. “I can see that there’s no standing back and watching, any longer. I have to choose a side. I always strive to be on the right side of history.” He looks between you and Sans, then out across the baseball diamond. “Even someone like me needs to make that decision.” He says, and manages to make that sentence somehow indicate the ridiculousness of a man with binoculars and a bird journal springing to your defense. 

“well… thanks. probably stopped me from… heh. thanks.” Sans says, shaking his head. 

“Don’t mention it.” Dennis replies. “You’re good neighbors. Loud, but… good.” He puts his phone back in his pocket, then picks up his binoculars from around his neck again. “I’ll let you get back to it.” He says, gives you a small wave, then wanders back into the foliage. 

“...welp.” Sans finally says. “those are our human defenders, babe.”

“Nerds.” You agree with a tiny laugh, then shrug. “Hey. He got the job done. And it’s not like we can turn down allies. Even if they are, um…”

“super boring.” Sans says, and takes your hand again, tracing a doorway in the air. He’s had enough of this particular walk.  
So have you.


	131. Wherein Capra Has A Feeling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [did you guys know i have a tumblr?](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

He comes home early - for him, which was late for everyone else, of course. Stepping into the kitchen, already loosening his tie, he takes a second to inhale. Salmon, he thinks. Rice? Well. It was either Alphys or Undyne’s night to cook. This was a close second to Papyrus nights, which were his favorite - though, of course, if anyone were to ask, his favorite was when Mettaton cooked. And, well, it wasn’t like Mettaton was a bad cook. Not at all. It was just… fussy. Too many foams and gels and flashy ornamental garnishes, and…

Capra had spent most of his formative years eating what a kid without any cooking experience could scrape together on his own. Lots of ramen. Lots of mac and cheese. Lots and lots of sandwiches. The whole… cooking without a microwave thing was still new to him.

Neither Alphys or Undyne are in the kitchen, though. _You_ are, hunched over your laptop with your headphones in, looking lost in thought. He walks over, waving his hand to get your attention. 

“Gah!’

He takes a certain vindictive pleasure from the way you jump, startled. Oh, that was kind of nice when it was happening to someone else. “Hey, buddy.” He snickers, carefully shrugging out of his suit jacket and folding it neatly over the back of a chair. “What’s up?” 

You look up at him, rubbing your eye. “My fiance is weird shapes.” You sigh, pulling out your headphones. 

“...Huh?” 

“Tommy and Aaron’s wedding is this weekend. We lost track of time. He needs something to wear. I made him try on his suit again and it’s not working. And of course he’s just, like… slightly off norm- well, human proportions, anyway.” You grumble. “And I’m trying to find an oddly shaped gentleman’s store that can deliver a suit-”

“Oh!” Capra laughs. “Is that all? Relax. I’ll just take him to my guy.” 

“...You have a guy?” You start, then shake your head. “What am I saying. Of course you have a guy.” 

“I mean, we don’t have time to go bespoke, but I’m sure with a fitting and tailoring we can work it out.” He shrugs. “My treat.” This isn’t as generous of an offer as it seems; he’d have paid an obscene amount to force Sans to dress properly just for one day, and now, with your tacit approval, he was practically guaranteed an extremely entertaining afternoon. 

“Oh… thank god. You’re a lifesaver.” You say through a heavy breath, and before he knows it, you’re on your feet and hugging him. 

This is weird. 

He doesn’t bolt or extricate himself, though. Doesn’t even try to. He just stands there, then, after a second, pats your back gingerly. This is clearly something you need. 

When he touches you, you seem to recall that you aren’t exactly on hugging terms, the two of you. You lurch back, a rueful smile on your face. “Sorry,” You’re already saying, “I forgot about your… thing…”

“Are you okay?” He asks, very quietly, giving you an out so you can pretend that you didn’t hear it. He doesn’t know what’s going on, but he knows _something’s_ up. You look up at him, and he _worries._

“Yeah.” You say unconvincingly. “Yeah. Rough day at the aquarium, that’s all.” You hesitate for a second, then shake your head. “Hey, lemme put some food back in the oven for you. Alphys made teriyaki salmon and broccoli but it’s gone all cold. You wanna do me a favor and check on Sans while I warm it up? He’s upstairs building a crib.” He watches your hand move reflexively - defensively? - over your midsection as you say that. “He swore he didn’t need my help and it would take him ten minutes, but that was like an hour ago.” 

“Okay. Yeah. Happy to help.” He assures you. “Is, uh, Mettaton-”

“He texted, said he’d be late. Long shoot.” You say, moving to the fridge. “I’m sure he texted you too.”

“Uh, we’re not really on that-”

“Oh for fuck’s sake.” You laugh, then yawn. “You’re adults. You worry about where the other one is. You’re _dating_. Get on that level, Cap. Now, go help your best friend build a baby container.” You scold, though you’re still smiling. 

“Sure thing, boss.” He snorts, and makes a show of ambling lazily out of the kitchen, looking unperturbed, before he fishes out his phone. 

_Hey. Heard you had a late shoot. Sucks._

Nope. Probably not the right tone. Delete delete delete...

_c u soon._

Nope, that was even worse. He bites his lip. 

Peter: Hey, hope your shoot is going well. Knock ‘em dead. I’m waiting for you at home. 

...Ugh. That was probably okay, right? Was that… Fuck, he had to stop overthinking this stuff. Then again, that was always his problem. Couldn’t shut down the fucking brain and not pick it all apart, everything, every single goddamn thing…

Relax, Peter. 

He changes quickly, and goes upstairs to your room, guessing that this is the most likely place for crib construction. He’s not wrong. He can hear the sound of shuffling and a muffled curse from the hallway, and the door, for once, is open. 

He peeks his head in to find Sans in a pile of vaguely crib shaped debris, a look of utter panic on his face. 

“oh thank god. help.” He whimpers. Capra takes a second to really, really appreciate that he’s being a total hero today, and then he grins and moves in to kneel next to Sans.

“What’s the matter, bud? I know the instructions can’t be that confusing, I watched you build like half of the new Core yourself, so-”

“are you kidding me?” He sounds weak. “every single step, it’s like ‘be certain to insert the peg at exactly a 39 degree angle and if you don’t your baby will definitely die and it’ll be your fault for building a crib wrong, and i don’t even know what this baby’s gonna be, and what if it’s one of the ones that actually needs the peg to be at 37 degrees and if it’s 39 it dies and-”

“Okay. Okay.” Capra cuts him off with a laugh. “Nobody’s gonna let your kid get hurt, bud. Now let’s just… start again, from the beginning.”

“..ok.” Sans nods reluctantly, and grabs the instructions again. “step one: take long bar (t) and insert pegs in holes 2, 5 and 8…” 

For a while, they work this way, constructing a skeleton of a crib for something that might well be a skeleton of a kid. Sans doesn’t have much to say besides the basic directions he’s reading out, which has Capra worried again. It’s not like him. No jokes? No sarcastic remarks? It’s not right. 

“Okay. Seriously. What’s going on.” He finally demands, once the tricky part is over and they’re down to just cosmetic details. Sans looks over at him, fiddling with a washer between his fingers. 

“we walked through the park to go to a baby store today.” He says, after a moment of clear deliberation. “some guys came out of nowhere. out of the baseball dugouts. they were drunk. one of ‘em had a bat.”

“Oh god, Sans. Shit-” Capra begins, already grimacing, but Sans holds up a hand. 

“‘s fine. nobody got hurt. but… he was acting like he was gonna take a swing, you know? at her. at… her belly.” He mutters, and the metal washer in his hand makes a slight clattering noise. It takes Capra a second to realize that his hand is shaking. “i coulda… i almost…” He pauses, and closes his eyesockets. “it’s ok. nobody did anything. our neighbor was in the park too, he called the cops i guess. but pete…” He opens his eyes again, looking worried. “i can’t always be there. and she’s already got so much to stress about. and… what if it just gets worse? she barely looks pregnant now. we were so happy this morning, and… god, what do i do? what kinda dad can’t keep his own kid safe? what kinda husband lets someone threaten to beat the baby outta their wife?!” He sounds frantic now, and Capra has to - HAS to - step in. 

“Quit that bullshit.” He says firmly, and Sans freezes, looking… staggered. “Some people were shitty. Beyond shitty.” He says quietly. “That happens, dude. You didn’t let your fiancee get hurt, though. Or your kid. If… the neighbor guy, whatever, if he wasn’t there, you still would have taken care of it, or she would have. You’ve been doing the right thing this whole time. She’s never defenseless, you know that. She’s got a spear, and fucking, fucking Spot, and.. christ, she’s got force field shoes. Because you’ve been worrying about this stuff and doing the right things this whole time.” He says firmly. “Know what a good dad does? He protects his family from getting hurt. He prepares for contingencies. He worries about getting the pegs of the crib he’s building in at the right angle.” He runs his hand through his hair distractedly as Sans gawks at him. “Take it from me. I know what a bad dad looks like. So do you. You’re never gonna fuck it up _that_ bad.” He says with a snort of laughter. 

Sans thinks for a moment, then, slowly, he lets out a chuckle of his own. “suppose i’d have to work pretty damn hard to fuck up on the level of either of our dads.” He admits. Then; “i know. i know i’m being stupid. it’s just… i don’t like how little i know about all of this. how am i supposed to do this right when i don’t even know what my kid’s gonna be?!”

“You’ll figure it out. You’re smart.” Capra assures him with a shrug. 

“‘smart.’ couldn’t even put together a damn crib…”

“Yeah,” Capra says pointedly. “ _Alone._ Good thing you guys have the rest of us, huh?” He gives him a crooked smile, after a moment. “You made this whole big deal out of calling us ‘family’ the other day. Well, bud, I don’t have a _ton_ of experience when it comes to functioning families, but I’m pretty sure they help each other out, right? I mean… you know there’s a reason there’s so many people living in this house, right? Even someone like… me?” His brow furrows as he thinks of what to say. 

“I keep thinking, you know. I’ve got a home. I’ve got a home I own. I’ve got mirrors that are getting dusty and a view that can’t be beat and a three minute commute and I’ve got all of that good shit, and I could go back to it. But I don’t.” He hesitates, then commits. “Let me tell you a secret. I tried. The night I figured out what I could…” He waves his hand in the air, a gesture to represent magic. “I got in a fight with Threep before, and I tried. I got in my car and I went back to my house and I sat there in silence for a whole half hour before I couldn’t stand it and I came back. I mean, fuck. What does that tell you? I used to be so happy being alone and now I’ve got you assholes and I can’t make myself leave. You’ve got something special here. All of us do.”

“oh.” Sans looks dumbfounded for a second, then squints suspiciously at Capra. “is this like a prank thing? ‘s not like you to give the big sitcom speech.”

“I knowwwww.” Capra groans. “I’m going so soft, bud, it’s the goddamn worst!”

“no, you’re not.” Sans says, after a moment of clear thought. “you’re just, uh, giving yourself permission to not be an asshole. you’re figuring out that it’s gonna be ok if you… you know. if you love people who aren’t named peter capra.”

“Woah.” He interjects at once. “Woah there. Nobody said anything about-”

“it’s not a dirty word, cap.” Sans sighs, raising those sparks in his eyesockets to the sky as if he’s pleading with a higher force for help. 

“Okay. But.”

“...i know. you’ll get there when you get there.” Sans sighs, shaking his head. “i just hope you don’t wait too long, pal. mettaton might be a pain in my ass, but that guy sure as hell loves _you._ ”

Oh. 

“Heh.” He manages weakly, and Sans lets out a quiet snicker, seeing, probably, all the color that’s drained from his face. 

“...you need to go take a walk and think about that?” Sans drawls. 

“Yup.” He nods at once. Sans snickers once more, and nods at the door. 

“that’s cool. i got it from here.”

Capra’s lost in thought for the rest of the night. He hadn’t really figured that… well, that this would happen. Any of it. The dating a robot. The… dating. And now here he was, and there Threep was, and… fuck, something _had_ happened. He didn’t know precisely when, but it was there. That thing that made him check his phone throughout the day just in case Mettaton had texted him, the happy thrill all through him when it turned out that his boyfriend had. The word boyfriend itself, how it sent a shiver of fear and panic up his spine still, but how it was accompanied with something like… protectiveness. Pride?

The way Mettaton said Capra’s name - always Peter, never Capra, even though he was so used to being called the other that they were more or less interchangeable in his mind. The way Capra felt when Mettaton was away on business, or, worse, when he came home after a trip and Capra’s heart was too loud and all warm and he couldn’t keep the smile off his face and...

Fuck.

He eats his salmon, lost in thought, pretending to read a magazine. You look like you might be about to question him, but then Sans nudges you and shakes his head, and you back off, giving him an amused smile. 

Double fuck. 

You eventually leave, tugged by Sans, who’s now eager to show off the crib, and then he’s alone in the kitchen still, just… thinking, pushing a few grains of rice around on his plate. 

He’s still thinking, two hours later, when Mettaton finally walks in the door, looking weary and unamused. Capra feels his palms prickle with sweat. Gross. The second the robot lays eyes on him, though, that look on his face changes to something softer, something much more gentle. 

“Oh, Peter, you weren’t waiting for me were you? You need to eat, darling, honestly, the men in this house, Papyrus is the only one I can count on to actually eat all his meals at a reasonable-”

“Hey.” Capra’s mouth feels dry. “I love you.”


	132. Wherein Capra and Mettaton Get Real Mushy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey no regular stream today but I'll probably be streaming a videogame or something tonight at my [Twitch](https://www.twitch.tv/totalskeletontrash)

“I’m … I’m sorry, what?” 

Mettaton’s just standing there in the doorway to the kitchen, looking like someone had applied googly eyes to his face.

Ah, fuck. This had been a hell of a choice, Peter. Fuck, fuck, fuck.   
“I… oh, fuck, this is not how I saw this playing out. Fuck.” He groans, burying his head in his hands, resting his elbows on the kitchen island.

“I love you.” He tells the kitchen island. 

“What.” Repeats the non-kitchen-island-robot-ghost-monster he can no longer make eye contact with. 

“Aw, christ, man. You heard me.” He mutters. The certainty that he’d felt just moments before is gone, replaced by something gnawing and miserable and horrified. Why had he trusted Sans?! Sans didn’t know shit about love! 

...Okay, well, that one was objectively untrue, Capra. Love was Sans’ whole deal, love and like, those occasional flashes of ‘i’m gonna fuck up the entire world if you hurt someone i love.’ But that was different than this. Sans had found you, and you and him were just _soulmates_. Monsters were always commenting on how well the two of you fit together, like your souls were perfect compliments, forged in the same fire, blah blah blah blah blah.

That didn’t happen with him and Threep. No, what they got from monsters was the weird double-take, the one he couldn’t understand because his _bullshit, useless, asshole_ magic didn’t seem to be the sort to let him do that, understand souls. No, he could only David Tennant hapless motherfuckers and he couldn’t even see the soul of the man he, fuck, loved, he didn’t even know the color and _why_ , why had he ever thought that this would work out, that Mettaton would love him too, because Sans was wrong and he should have just-

“Peter.” A soft touch on his back. “Please look at me.” 

He obeys, of course. He has to. He picks his head up, trying to pull one of his usual defensive expressions on - the stony glare, no, no, the wide grin, no - but it doesn’t come to him. 

“I’m sorry.” He mutters, and Mettaton takes in a deep breath.

“Please don’t say that.” He finally exhales. “I…”

Capra’s heart stutters, just for a second, then plummets once more when the robot finds himself unable to complete the sentence.

“Come walk with me.” Mettaton says, and Capra stands up (heh) robotically, his eyes sliding away and down to the floor again like Mettaton was covered with WD-40 or something, well, metaphorical WD-40, the kind that could make it so -

Get your shit together, Peter.   
God, he just _knew_ , he _knew_ there was a reason he’d never allowed himself to do this before. It was classic risk management. Each step you take up a ladder increases your chance of injury when you fall. How many steps had he taken up this metaphorical fucking ladder, never realizing that the fucking _rungs_ were covered with meta-fucking-phorical WD-goddamn-40-

They’re outside, making their way to the beach. Why was it that everyone in this house needed to use the same goddamn set piece, himself included?! He’d already had his dramatic low point at the beach. Couldn’t they do something more appropriate? Why not the bombed out skeletons of topiaries Sans had promised him had once been two swans and a velociraptor in the front yard? 

The air is sticky, and heavy, and the stars are obscured by big purple clouds that feel too close. He can’t even see the peak of Mt. Ebott across the bay, and he can hear the rumble of either thunder or a jet, and there’s heat lightning snapping occasionally at the horizon and he-

“I love you.” Mettaton says quietly. 

He stops dead in his tracks, astonished. 

“...Well, what the fuck, man?!” He finally gasps out. “Why would-”

“I want to be sure.” Mettaton says, even quieter, and sinks to a seat on the stone retaining wall separating grass from sand. Capra is still frozen for a second, but eventually, he manages to get his legs to move. He sits next to Mettaton, not touching the guy, just a few centimeters away.

“What do you mean?” He asks, when Mettaton doesn’t seem to be inclined to explain himself further. Mettaton hesitates again, clearing his throat with a funny metallic rasp. 

“Peter. Have you ever been in love before?” He asks, at last. Capra pauses, then shakes his head. 

“No. I’ve _liked_ people before, but… no.” He admits, then a thought strikes him, one he doesn’t like at all. “Oh, uh, have you?” 

“No.” Mettaton says simply, taking his hand as he does so. He’s embarrassed by the rush of relief he feels at this answer. “But… Peter. Have you ever loved _anyone_ before?”

“You just asked-”

“There’s a difference.” Mettaton says. “Between loving and being in love. I just want to make sure… Peter, you’ve been through a lot, these past few months.” He pronounces slowly, inching just a tiny bit closer as he speaks. “You’re not the man I met, the day after those… idiots destroyed downtown.”

“Neither are you.” Capra has to point out, and Mettaton lets out a soft laugh of realization. 

“No. I suppose I’m not. I feel like I am… _constantly_ changing, ever since I was given this body. I am… always trying to find ways, to fill all of this empty space.” He says, tapping his chest with a soft ping. “But...I’ve always been loved, and I’ve always loved, even before I was a star. I had my family. My friends. Alphys. But you... As far as I understand it, you’ve always stayed detached, and now that you’re not, I just need to be sure that you know what you’re saying. Feeling. There’s a difference between loving someone and being in love with someone.” He repeats, and Capra, his head swimming, shakes his head. 

“I know.” He says. “I’ve loved people before.”

“...Who?” Mettaton says quietly, and Capra detects something very close to pity in that question, something that makes him want to stand up and walk very quickly away - the muscles in his thighs clench and he thinks about being a kid, running track, just _running_...

He doesn’t run. He doesn’t speak. He just glances behind him and nods his head, once, at the house.

Mettaton looks surprised for a moment, but then something clicks into place. “Ah. Of course.”

“I didn’t do a great job of showing it.” Capra mutters. “They practically adopted me, in the beginning. They listened to me and supported me and bought me pizza and… fuck, her dad learned to play Dungeons and Dragons for me. They cosigned my first car, my first apartment. Found ways to give me odd jobs for extra money. Trusted me with their kid. And I fucking sold them out, I stopped calling, I touched that fucking barrier and I made myself become the type of person I thought they wanted me to be.” His shoulders slump, and he shakes his head. “But yeah. I loved them. I even loved her. Then they died, and that was my excuse to shut that all off. But… look. Please. I know I’m a shit, but please don’t look at me like that.” He says abruptly, seeing it there on Mettaton’s face like that, the thing that’s in the pity family. 

“Peter-”

“I’m in love with you. I understand the difference. It freaks me the fuck out, because I never, ever thought I’d be in love with anyone, but I am now. I love the stupidest goddamn things about you, I swear to god, I feel like a goddamn idiot for loving them sometimes - shit, this is not romantic-”

Mettaton’s laughing now, a little. “Like what?” He asks.

“Like the way you pour yourself a bowl of cereal you know you’re not going to eat in the morning, you wasteful maniac!” Capra laughs, and Mettaton bursts out laughing at that too. “Or how you mouth along with all your lines when you’re watching one of your movies. Or how you have been slowly creeping onto my half of the bed over the span of two months like you don’t think I’ll notice! Anyone else, I’d be so annoyed, but when you do that shit all I can think of is ‘wow, there’s something special about this guy.’ And I figured out what it is. It’s because I love you.”

Mettaton takes a few moments to stop laughing, and then he looks seriously at Capra again. 

“I love you too. More than I think I should.” He says softly. “I think, with anyone else, if anyone… acted how you do. Like calling me your boyfriend physically hurts-”

“Fuck, I’m sorry-”

“I know. I know why it’s tough.”

“It’s not about you, it’s about me-”

“I know.” Mettaton says, and takes in a big breath, looking out at the heavy clouds hanging over the horizon, at the occasional flash of lightning that makes the whole sky flicker green. “God knows I’ve called myself ten types of stupid. That’s the one thing I think I know about relationships, that you’re not supposed to go into them trying to fix someone. Wait.” He says, sensing Capra’s instant protest before it even happens. “I’m not. You’re trying to fix yourself. And I’m not perfect here. Don’t tell anyone I ever said that.” He says with a snort, tossing his hair distractedly so that, for once, it isn’t in his eyes. “I’m … I’m fixing myself too. I think. I’m trying.” 

They’re silent for a long while, listening to the distant thunder rumble.

“I never thought I would feel like this. Not with a human, especially. And with _you_ , well-”

“Ha, what’s that supposed to mean!?” Capra laughs, though he still feels a little indignant from the phrasing. Mettaton laughs quietly, and then there’s the sensation of cool lips on his neck, brushing over to find his pulse for a heartbeat or two. It’s enough to distract him from that moment of indignation, and then he’s just sitting there, wondering why they’re talking about the fact that they love each other like it’s a problem, like it’s something that hurts. Isn’t it… it’s supposed to be a good thing. Still, he’s distracted, and he’s leaning closer to Mettaton when the robot inches his lips away and speaks up again. 

“It’s just that with monsters, it’s so much easier. We can see each other’s souls, and there’s a lot you can tell, just from looking. But you… you can’t see mine, and when I look at yours, all I can see is _me_ staring back. And, no. I’m not narcissistic enough that I particularly enjoy that.” He says with a soft laugh. “I just wish I knew…”

“Oh.” Capra says, and as another fork of lightning lights up the sky, fucking… fucking eureka. He knows, he knows, wrong scientist, that wasn’t a very Ben Franklin line, but, “Mettaton, just… you can touch it.”

He can practically _feel_ the weight of the stare on him.

“Peter… are you absolutely certain?” Mettaton says softly, but there’s something in that tone Capra’s never heard before, a delighted, thrilled excitement that his boyfriend is trying so, so hard not to let out. “You can’t offer this if you’re just feeling pressured.” He continues. “This is serious. This is-”

“Yes.” He cuts Mettaton off. He feels confident. He knows now that this was one of the things that you and Sans did, that it was intimate in a way that most humans didn’t get to know, but… Mettaton could know. He could _show_ him. Mettaton could understand, just like that, how he’d grown to feel about him, and then everything would be perfect. Everything would be perfect, and he would let himself do this, and he could just be done with being this stupid damaged asshole. “I want this. I keep everyone else out, but … I want you to know.”

“Ah.” Mettaton’s attempt to sound level and calm is cracking apart now. “Oh dear, I… should we… go inside?”

“No.” Capra says quickly, with a laugh. “Now. While I’m still being honest. Before I lose my nerve.”

Mettaton raises his hand in a gesture that is at once familiar and unfamiliar, and then, again, he hesitates, locking eyes with Capra in the dim light.

“You’re sure you’re ready-”

“Yes.” He thinks so, anyway. “Please.”

Mettaton can’t resist that. He makes a noise that might be expressing how overwhelming this is, or might be simple despair - not the second one, not the second one, please, please, not the - and he leans forward, crushing his lips to Capra’s, and for a second, Capra just crushes right back, trying to show him, each of them trying to prove that they’re ready for this-

There is a twinge, something that isn’t pain but is pain-adjacent, and then he’s -

_vulnerable-_

His shields are gone, his defenses are down, Mettaton’s found that hole in his armor, that womp rat sized defect in that Death Star he’s built up around himself, the bastard has bulls-eyed it, and as Capra jerks away, heart pounding, for a second he can see something there, something in the air in front of him, hovering over Mettaton’s palm, something chrome and magic and him, that was _him_ , that gleaming, faintly purple shape, that cartoon heart hovering there like one of the really good balloons you got at a supermarket checkout, all shiny and he can’t catch his breath, he doesn’t know if he can do this, he doesn’t know if he _likes_ this, because part of this is freedom, and part of this is what an animal must feel as it’s butchered, all the things that were always supposed to stay inside spilling messily out-

“Peter.” Mettaton checks quietly. “We can stop. You don’t have to.”

He loves him. He loves him. “Please.” He whispers, even more desperate now to prove this, to prove that he’s worthy of being loved in return.

Mettaton’s fingers are shaking as they brush his soul and he can’t see his soul anymore and-

It’s okay.

He gasps in a breath, but he doesn’t need to gasp, he’s already relaxing because…

Oh fuck, this is what it feels like to be loved. 

Mettaton makes a quiet sound, a content sound, and Capra tries to keep his eyelids open but he practically can’t because this is just…

Safe. 

He doesn’t need to prove himself here, right now. He can just be a human, a collection of triumphs and flaws, and he watches them float dreamily by, just memories, feelings, flickering, and none of them hurt any longer. Broken bones, a screaming drunk father, a girl laughing at him when he’d asked her out… and his first kiss, the feeling of crossing the finish line first at a race, the moment where the car he’d designed had made its first turn on its own and he’d thought his heart would explode with adrenaline and joy and a tiny bit of sorrow and and and this other person is seeing it all, and he loves him anyway, and it’s okay, and they’re moving dreamily from thought to thought, Mettaton is soothing his regrets, and then they’ve arrived at the kitchen, all those months ago, where Mettaton had tried to teach him how to cook and he’d just been trying to get the man in bed, and when that wasn’t going to work, to at least ruffle his feathers-

_If you’re not going to help, just leave._ Mettaton had said snottily, after Capra had dropped an entire tray of rolls just because he was only paying attention to his phone - Capra can feel Mettaton’s amused chagrin as they look back on this now.   
_Fine._ Back-then-Capra had said. I’ll go. But don’t act like you’re not fully charmed by me. Mettaton had turned his nose up at him. Capra had rolled his eyes. _You have to fall in love with me eventually._ He’d said. _Everybody does._

In his head, in his soul, Capra and Mettaton are amused, entertained at how far they’d come. They watch Capra as he’d stomped down the hall to find his friends in the other room, how he’d griped about Mettaton throwing him out, and they reflect that this is where it had all started. 

_Man. I thought it was gonna be funnier._ Undyne had said.  
 _give it time._ Sans had replied, and Capra remembering this, floating blissfully, nearly rolls his eyes. Sans had been so convinced that this would all fall spectacularly apart, and now here they were, and-

Something’s nagging at him, though.

He thinks, and he can feel Mettaton’s worry as they begin to fall out of sync, and he’s trying to figure out what’s wrong, and he can hear his heart again, can hear the sound of the wind and the waves and the thunder and-

Oh god, fuck, no.

_You have to fall in love with me eventually._ He’d said. 

People did what he told them to do.


	133. Wherein You Make A Choice

He can fucking _taste_ the panic welling up in him. 

He’d never asked for this.

Oh, god, had he? Had he fucking asked for this?

He’d been _normal_. A kid. He’d been fine and then he’d stuck his fucking hand in a force beyond his comprehension and now thirteen years later and none the fucking wiser he was a goddamn, a fucking -

**monster**

and there wasn’t any fixing this how could there be any fixing this

Mettaton’s still holding his soul and he’s coming unmoored now too, Capra can feel it; he’s panicking, and that’s making Mettaton panic, and Mettaton’s panic is echoing back and making it worse, making it so much worse, and he could just fucking drown under all the fear and shame and guilt and utter fucking disgust with himself

he’d made this happen

he wants to run so bad his legs are cramping with the panic and part of him doesn’t even care about Mettaton, part of him just wants to get away from the source of this hurt, but Mettaton’s holding his soul so tight and he doesn’t want to hurt him anymore and he doesn’t want this and he can practically feel - no, he can literally feel - Mettaton’s mind working in overdrive, his circuitry inside crackling in desperation, trying so hard to find a way to make this okay

“Let go.” Capra croaks, and Mettaton, at once, lets go.

Of course he does.

There’s a long, painful, raw stretch of time where the only sounds are the distant thunder and Capra’s ragged, pathetic breaths. He pulls his soul back into himself, somehow, and he bows his head and he tries to pull it all in. Tries to make sense of any of this. 

“Peter.” Mettaton whispers, after the silence has grown worse than either of them can bear.

“Don’t.” Capra says. 

Mettaton hesitates, then falls silent. 

“I’m going to fix this.” Capra whispers, after another eternity of thought. “I’m so sorry. I’m going to fix this.”

“Peter. Please.” There’s something like dread in Mettaton’s voice now, as he turns, at last, to look at him. “Please don’t. Don’t do this.”

Mettaton’s touched his soul. He _knows_ Capra, every atom of him, all the space between those atoms. He knows him, so he knows what he’s going to do, and he’s already braced for the impact. 

Capra doesn’t want to let him hit that wall. He doesn’t want to do the thing he needs to do, and that’s the really, truly fucked up part of all of this. None of him wants this. This is the right thing to do and he hates it. He hates that he’s just going to bring more pain onto this being that he loves, but there isn’t, there isn’t an alternative! His mind is always spinning with alternatives, always testing for different avenues, different ways to get the same thing done, but this-

“You have to stop loving me. I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry. I did something terrible to you, and it doesn’t… it doesn’t matter that it was an accident. So stop. I’m so sorry. Please. Please, stop.” 

He can’t look at Mettaton as he speaks. He can’t find the force of will, the fucking grace to look him in the eye. He’s so… ashamed. Horrified. Maybe even a little humiliated, that he’d allowed himself to think that this was real. Like a kid who was only just now realizing that he’d been tricked, that there was no secret admirer waiting for him at prom, just a group of giggling bullies and that all that joy and exhilaration were worse now, because he’d felt them for something that wasn’t even real, something that was sick and wrong.

And it was still his fault. He was the bad guy here. No Peter Capra’s Going To Save The World headlines here tonight, boys. No-

“I can’t.” Mettaton says quietly. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”

“What?” He sounds nearly hysterical to his own ears. “But I.. I said it-”

“I can’t just stop.” Mettaton says, his mouth forming a straight, defiant line - in his shock, Capra had turned to look, and now he had to see this, see the man he loved somehow deny him this one thing, the only moral choice, the only thing that would make him not the biggest piece of shit on the planet.

“Why?” The word nearly sounds like a laugh. “...Everything else I ever say, Threep, you do it. But not this. Not the one thing I could ever do right. Why can’t you give me this?”

The silence fills up his lungs, replacing the damp, sticky air, leaking into him, forcing its way past the hard lump in his throat.

“I don’t know.” Mettaton whispers.

He doesn’t run. He doesn’t run. He can’t fucking move.

Mettaton’s still watching him, when, for the first time in what is very nearly thirteen years, he begins to cry.

\------------------------------------------------------------------

Sans seems to have gotten out of his funk. Cap must have had a good talk with him, which was something of a relief. You’d been a little worried about your fiance from the wary way he’d been looking around the furniture store, like another man with a bat was going to come take a swing at the Dot the second either one of you dropped your guard.

Okay. You’d been on edge too. That hadn’t been a fun experience for you. It was the weirdest damn thing; a few months ago, this little speck of nothingness hadn’t even existed, and now, well… you wanted it. You wanted it so damn badly. You wanted this to be the timeline that played out, the one where you and Sans and your kid got to be happy and healthy, and the second that illusion was challenged, well, both of you had been ready to…

Do bad stuff.

Now, at least, things have calmed down a little. Sans is totally thrilled with himself for building a working crib; one that both of you test out by plopping an increasingly displeased Ghost in it. Papyrus, Alphys and Undyne all come home, and Sans drags them up, one by one, to admire his crib building skills (and maybe, just a little, to make sure that they all can see that you’re showing.)

“You’re never going to get that crib out through this door.” Undyne notes, arching an eyebrow. Sans blinks, then looks at the crib.

“huh. whoops.” He says, looking at the neat spot the crib had been pushed to, up against your bedroom wall. Oh, you can’t blame him, after today, for wanting the baby close. It is, however, kind of cute how he’s acting like it was an accident.

“Whoops.” You repeat dryly, then lean forward to give him a quick peck. “Welp. I guess our post-baby love life is going to be prettttttty boring.” You shouldn’t tease him, but you just… _have_ to. Undyne cackles as Sans looks, for a moment, surprised, but it only takes him a second to say,

“or, uh, way more exciting, if the bedroom’s off limits- ow!” He pretends that the flick you give him hurts more than it ever could, but, well, now Undyne’s laughing at the blush on your face and that’s not fair! It was only fair when she was laughing at Sans, you were pretty sure about that.

“You guys are gross.” She snorts, and then gives you a sharklike grin. “Second grossest couple in the house.” 

“well, yeah, we can’t beat you guys.” Sans drawls, but his heart’s not in it. “i hope cap’s alright, though. last we saw him he was thinkin’ big thoughts.” 

“Mushy thoughts.” You agree with a grin, nudging Sans. He rolls his eyes, but nods his head.

“super mushy. babe, lessgo watch tv or something. undyne, you and alph wanna do movie night?” Undyne thinks about this.

“Nah.” She decides. “I’m gonna work on the whole lots of babies thing while Alphys is fresh off of seeing this adorable crib. Catch you nerds later!” 

She saunters out of your room and Sans gives you an amused look.

“kitchen nightmares?” He proposes, then cracks up laughing, seeing how excited you immediately get. 

“PLEASE?” 

“ok. ok. let’s watch ramsay yell at some people.” He says indulgently. 

\---------------------------------------------------

It turns out that what Sans really wants is less Gordon Ramsay, and more ‘cuddling and touching your belly.’ Which, if you’re being perfectly honest with yourself, is just fine by you. For right now, you can enjoy the rare moment of peace, especially knowing that it will almost certainly be shattered the instant Mettaton and Capra walk back in. 

You’re getting too comfy, all the same, your eyelids drifting closed, when, with a sudden clatter, you hear the back door in the kitchen slide open.

“shit.” Sans sighs, straightening up a little (and inching his hand away from your waistband, where he’d not too subtly been drifting).

“Yep.” You agree, sitting up as well. You only have a moment or two before the loud footsteps in the kitchen become loud footsteps in the hallway, and then -

Capra is walking towards you, tears in his eyes -

For a split second, your head aches - fuck, what is that - and then you gasp, realization coming all at once.

“babe?” Sans says at once, looking between you and Capra urgently.

“I… I’ve seen this before.” You whisper, distracted. And you have. In your jaunt through the depths of time with Gaster, you have seen this thread of time before. And so, when Capra speaks, his words almost don’t surprise you.

“You. Please. You can take it from me.”

“what?” Sans is unamused. “cap, buddy, have you been drinking-”  
“Please.” Capra’s ignoring Sans now, totally fixed on you. “You took it from Gaster. Please. You could take it from me.” 

“...What?” You whisper, but part of you already knows what he’s asking.

“My soul.” He rasps. “Whatever part of me makes me like this. Whatever part of me could have forced a man to love me, please. Please.” He takes a breath. “Please.” He whispers once more, and takes another step closer, arms practically pinned to his sides, forcing you to look at the place in his chest where something purple and silver gleams, the seat of his magic, the seat of-

“pete, what…” Sans begins, but then, in the doorway behind Capra, his eyes focus on Mettaton, looking wretched and destroyed and not able to meet anyone’s eyes but yours. He shakes his head, just once, but then Capra whirls, wild eyed, sensing him, and he has to speak up. 

“Don’t, Peter.”

“This is it. This is the only way. A person like me can’t have something like this. I can’t tell people to… fuck. Fuck. Look at her. She’s good! She’s good. She’s better than me. She always has been. She won’t hurt anyone.” Capra turns back to look at you, and you flinch, processing at last what he’s asking of you. 

Capra’s got a mess on his hands.

And you’re a sponge. 

“Cap, no.” You say weakly, holding up a hand. “That’s your soul. I can’t-”

“ _I was never supposed to be like this!_ ” He cuts you off. “You remember me? I was a fucking… loser! It wasn’t ever me! All these years. It wasn’t ever me! I’m not the guy with the suits, I’m not the guy people fall in love with! I’m... “ He wipes his eyes roughly on his sleeve. “Please.” He says again, after a moment. “Take it. I’ve done something horrible and-”

“babe…” Sans starts to caution, looking warily between you and Capra.

“You’re always kind.” Capra whispers through his tears. “You try to do the right thing.” 

“Peter, it’s your _soul!_ ” Mettaton hisses.   
“Please.” Peter repeats, and fixes that gaze on you, blue irises in their bloodshot frame, and the desperation, the fear, the horror there is frightening.

And before you know it, you’re standing. 

“_________!” Sans sounds alarmed now. “think about-”

“I think… this is what I’m supposed to do.” You mutter, your brain half full with memories, with the sense of a timeline you’ve stumbled into by accident, one with only one possible conclusion, one with no turning around.

Capra, seeing what you’re going to do, suddenly relaxes. He looks almost overjoyed, but under that he just looks sick. 

“Don’t.” Mettaton says weakly. 

“Please.” Capra says, one more time. 

It’s just a tug. One quick motion, one grit of your teeth, and then-

“oh god.” Sans sounds sick, watching as you draw that power coiled in the center of Capra’s soul away, letting it pour into you, and leaving something behind that is small and dull and gray.


	134. Wherein Nobody Leaves And Everything Is Fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Have you even been to my tumblr?](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>  If you haven't, you might not know that some of you are now, technically, [movie stars. ](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/post/150149035576)
> 
> As an aside, if you've been enjoying the recent chapters and want to demonstrate that enjoyment in a tangible, uh, way, rumor round town is that the tip jar is still open. No pressure though. 
> 
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

There is a long, terribly awkward moment where nobody says anything. Then, simultaneously, everything falls apart. Mettaton’s staring at Capra’s soul, a look of increasing horror on his face that suddenly turns to vitriol. 

“I told you NOT to-” He begins, glaring at you, hurrying over to Capra. “Peter, are you-”

“Fine.” Capra hisses, looking pale. “Fine. Gotta sit-”

“don’t fucking yell at her, he just _told_ her to-” Sans chimes in, interjecting.

“He didn’t tell me to, I had to!” You protest. He whirls, his eyes wild. 

“because he told you to!”

“Because _I’ve seen this part of time before!_ ” You snap back. “Cap, are you-”

“Fine.” He says again, sinking onto the couch. “Fucking… ow.”

Sans gives him a look that conveys absolutely no sympathy. “you said ‘take it.’ you didn’t give her a damn choice.” He snarls, absolutely disgusted. 

“He said ‘Please, take it!’” Mettaton growls. “Which she shouldn’t have-”

“he made her!”

Tensions are growing way too high. You hear the sound of footsteps in the hall between the kitchen and the family room, but Undyne (or Papyrus or Alphys or L.D.) must have heard the screaming argument and determined that it was wisest to avoid this whole mess, rather than become involved, because nobody enters the room, leaving just Sans and Mettaton looking like they’re about to murder each other while Capra crumples in upon himself.

“All of you need to calm down.” You say (knowing, as you do so, that this is the worst possible thing to tell the two angry men), and suddenly Sans and Mettaton are glaring at you instead, which isn’t fair at all. (Capra is still seated, breathing hard, his face buried in his hands). Then, abruptly, the look on Sans’ face turns to one of horror.

“the baby.” He says, and a surge of panic watches over you - immediately, you glance down, shifting your body and cursing your damn boobs for being in the goddamn stupidass way, searching…

It’s still there, of course. Still brilliant green, still beautiful, absolutely unchanged.

“They’re fine.” You say quietly, as Capra mutters a soft curse under his breath.

“I didn’t think about that.” He admits, which sets Sans off again.

“you didn’t fucking think, period! what right do you have to make this her problem!? what the _hell_ , capra?! i thought you were our friend-”

“Sans. Please don’t be mad. It always happened that way.” You say quietly, and at last, when he looks at you, he just looks soft and concerned. 

“lemme see you.” He says quietly, taking your hand and tugging you to the side, out of the immediate vicinity of Mettaton and Capra. You watch them out of the corner of your eye all the same, though, just to make sure you haven’t accidentally… killed Capra, you suppose. Oh, Gaster had been fine after you’d pulled this stunt, but…

Gaster was a monster. Humans were different. 

Mettaton hesitates, then tentatively reaches to rest his hand on Capra’s back, looking a mixture of worried, hurt and still… oh, just furious. Capra doesn’t move, but it’s not the reassuring kind of not moving. He just looks too broken to have to deal with another thing right now. 

“are you ok?” Sans’ voice snaps you back to reality. 

“Me? Yeah, I feel… Um. Well. Exactly the same.” You admit quietly. His brow furrows, and there it is, the expected stare at your left boob region. 

“can i look closer?” He asks, and you give him a nervous smile.

“Of course.” 

He hesitates for a second, his eyes flashing to Capra and Mettaton, and you know it’s a basic, animal response - he doesn’t want your soul exposed and vulnerable around anyone, even your friends. But, after a moment, his need to see - now - what’s happened to you wins over. He reaches up (still taking a step so his body is firmly between you and the other people in the room) and raises his hand, and a second later, your soul is floating between the two of you, raw and exposed. You grimace, and he winces:

“should i put it back-”

“No, no, let’s look.” You say tightly, and for a second, both of you are engrossed, studying your soul. 

“...huh.” Sans says quietly. He seems intrigued, in spite of himself. It looks… well, more or less the same. The normal reds and oranges and yellows of flickering light, that tiny black flame in the core that represents Gaster’s magic (which you’d also sponged up).

“I don’t… huh.” You repeat, staring at your soul. “I don’t see… like, anything?”

“You mean it’s _gone?!_ ” Mettaton hisses, venomous. “You mean you took his soul and you just-”

“ **Good.** ” There’s a finality to Capra’s voice that you’ve never heard before. “Good fucking riddance.” He looks up, still looking weary and worn, but at least a little bit relieved. He looks at you for a second, wipes his eyes, then turns to look up at Mettaton. “Well?” He says quietly.

“I still love you.” Mettaton snaps. “You absolute piece of shit.” 

The corners of Capra’s mouth turn up in a morose smile. 

“Fuck.” It’s barely a whisper, the way he says it. “I always did love it when you swore.”

“...but it can’t be just gone.” Sans interrupts a spectacularly tense moment. “that’s not how magic works! i wrote fifteen papers on the conservation of magic and based on what i’ve seen you should have barely lost any… babe. do me a favor. tell me to do something.”

“Uh… okay, um. ‘Sans. Don’t ever take me up to the lab and make me stand under that camera again.’” You try out, a little hopefully. 

“heh. like hell i won’t.” He says, and for a second he even looks amused, until the gravity of the situation comes back to him. “but, uh, do something easier.” 

“Okay. Hop on one foot.” You say, recalling Capra’s request. 

Sans remains resolutely on two feet. 

“huh.” He says.

“Huh.” You repeat. 

“Oh, thank god.” Capra whispers, and stands up slowly, shaking off Mettaton’s hand at last. “Thank… oh, god.” He rubs his forehead. “It’s over.” For a second, he just stands there, staring into the middle distance, and for once, you’d give just about anything to know what was happening in that huge, stupid, brilliant brain. Then, with a sigh, he wipes his eyes once more, then absently touches his chest over his heart. “This feels…” He mutters, then trails off.

He looks determined, and that worries you.

He turns to you first. “I know.” He says. “I know what I asked you-”

“made her.” Sans spits.

“... Fuck. I hope I didn’t… Shit.” For a second, that determination wavers, and you shake your head.

“Cap, I woulda done it no matter what. I can’t describe… People… we’re not meant to see the future. I felt like… there was like something tugging me forward, almost. Not an order. I never noticed it, when you did those. This was different. This was… timeline bullshit. I’m… I’m sorry I saw, I suppose. I’m sorry I went in time and that this part didn’t have any other options.” You say, ducking your head. “Are you sure you’re going to be-”

“I’m fine.” He insists, and you think of all the times you’ve insisted the same thing, how rarely it’s actually been the case. You’re about to raise that exact protest, but he’s having none of it. “Well.” He says after a moment, then takes a step closer to you. 

Sans makes a noise that is very much like a growl, but when you glare at him, he blinks and then steps back, looking a little embarrassed. Mettaton gives him a withering, disgusted look, but when you meet the robot’s eyes, he can’t maintain eye contact for very long - he gets distracted by something on the floor, and you wonder what’s going through his head, if he’s embarrassed at the way he’d yelled at you for just doing what Capra had asked of you. After all, Capra seems… “fine.” 

You’re still surprised when two lean arms move unhesitatingly around you. 

You’ve hugged Capra before, of course. As a kid, you’d probably done it a million times, which he’d put up with only with the aid of spectacular college kid eyerolls. As an adult, you’d done it… maybe once, and felt him stiffen and lean away. So him, hugging you - oh, that feeling of dread comes back. 

“Cap…” You start.

“Thank you for everything.” He says quietly. “You’re your parents’ kid, you know that?” He releases you, then turns to Sans. “You too, bud. Well. You’re not your parent’s kid. Just as big a compliment.”

The irritation is off Sans’ face, now, and he just looks wary. 

“pete, bud… please don’t do anything dumb.” He mutters, and Capra lets out a weary laugh.

“I’m not. I swear to fucking god, for once in my life, I’m not.” He says, his voice sounding a little choked but very steady. All the same, he hesitates a little before he turns to Mettaton. 

“Peter. What are you going to do?” Mettaton says softly. Capra hesitates, then takes a deep breath, seeming to fortify himself. 

“I gotta head home, Threep.” He says, quiet but resolute. Mettaton processes this for a second, then glares at him. 

“You idiot. You are home.” He says witheringly. Capra hardly blinks. He just looks at Mettaton for a long moment, and you nearly say something when you realize what he’s doing.

It’s like he’s memorizing the other man. 

“You know I have to go.” Capra says, and you suddenly wish you were anywhere but here, witnessing this. “After what I did -”

“You didn’t do a damn thing!”

“I _forced you to love me._ ” Capra says, and at last, the emotion creeps back into his voice. “It doesn’t matter that it was an accident. I still did something terrible to you, and for all I fucking know, I still am.”

“Well… then… research it! You refused to even test it, and now-”

“I will.” Capra says, inclining his head. “But… I can’t stay here and do the what-ifs. I can’t sleep next to you and wonder if some part of you in there knows that I made this happen and hates me for it. It’s not right, Threep. I gotta go.” 

“At least stay here. In another bedroom.” Mettaton insists, sounding, now, less angry and more panicked as he realizes at last what’s happening. “We can-”

“It took me weeks. Not months. Weeks, before I was using my powers that I swore to god I’d never use, before I was using those on people, on purpose. How long do you think it would take me to convince myself that this is okay? That now that my powers are gone, that it’s okay that I…” He looks at Mettaton, trailing off, then shakes his head. “It’s sick of me. It’s sick, how much I already want that. So. I gotta go.” 

“Peter.” Mettaton has grown very quiet. “Please.”

Capra studies him again, for another painful moment. “I love you.” He says softly. “I’m so, so sorry.” Then, his jaw grows firm and stubborn. “I’m going to figure it out.” He says, and wipes his eyes one last time. “Sans, ________. Do me a favor, say bye to Paps and Undyne and Alph and LD for me, yeah?”

“...yeah, cap.” Sans says, resigned. “i don’t think you should-”

“Look, I’ll see you at work. It’ll be fine.” Capra, again, is not particularly convincing. He looks between the three of you for another few seconds, very nearly moves closer to Mettaton - and then he stops, turns on his heel, then walks through the hall. 

A few seconds later, you hear the garage door open, and then close.

The three of you stand still, silent, and then Mettaton turns to look at you. The anger is gone from his face now. 

“I think I’m going to bed.” He says softly, and exits the room in the other direction, each footstep a distinct click on the floor. Now it’s just Sans and you.

“babe.” Sans mutters.

“...Yeah?” You whisper back, and then his arms move around you, comforting and secure and familiar.

“i hate timeline bullshit.” He mumbles into your hair. 

So do you.

\----------------------------------------

She doesn’t think that she’s ever been up on the executive floor before. Capra was always everywhere at once in EbbCo, it seemed. The only time he was up in his actual office was when he had things to do that couldn’t be performed literally anywhere else. So this, this abrupt 8:30 AM meeting with the Archaeology Department (read: Natalie) was… 

Weird?

She raps on the door, and almost instantly, Capra answers,

“Come in!”

“Hi, Peter, you wanted to… yikes, what happened to your face!” Natalie says, startled. Capra blinks, then lifts his hand to his jaw. 

“Oh. I, uh, cut myself shaving.” He says, sounding a little embarrassed. 

“...Holy crap, Peter, haven’t you been shaving for like, twenty five years?” She scoffs before she can help herself, then takes him in. He looks bedraggled, weary. His hair is more of a mess than she ever could have imagined on the guy. And there’s that cut on his jaw, the bags under his eyes, and-

“Yeah. Think I might have lost my mojo. Like in, uh, Goldmember, you ever seen - know what, forget it. Goldmember is not important. I think I could get reported to H.R. for talking about Goldmember. No. We’re here to talk about caves.”

“...You mean the caves that it’s my job to discover and report? The ones of archaeological import? Because I don’t know anything about, like, actual geology-”

“Yeah, I’m talking about the archaeologically important caves.” His eyes flash, and there’s something strange in his expression now. “You know how we’re not supposed to go in there? And there’s a treaty to not go in there?” 

“...Yup.” She squirms guiltily, suspecting that Capra might know about your jaunts into the darkness of those caves together.

“How, uh, flexible are you?” Capra says, a little quieter. “Er. Legally speaking.” 

There’s a second where she has to mull this over.

“...Pretty damn. When, I mean, it comes to archaeological discoveries. Not like murder. Don’t ask me to murder someone.” Capra snorts at that. 

“No. Murder’s off the table. It just sounds like, from your first report, that there’s probably some good stuff about human mages in that cave system, right?”

“Um. Yup.” She thinks nervously about the mural, about the humans going ham on monster blood, and then tries very hard to not think about that. 

“I’d like you to find that good stuff, and bring it to me.” Capra says. 

“...It’s kind of dangerous down there.” She hedges slowly, thinking.

“Well then.” He shrugs. “Take a friend. Someone… trustworthy.” He says, and then looks up, his blue eyes suddenly piercing. “I want you to find out everything you can about what human mages did, understand? And also…” He waits, making absolutely sure she’s paying perfect attention.

“I need to know how to stop them.” He breathes, and even though he hasn’t said anything spooky at all, the intensity of his tone makes every hair on the back of her neck stand straight up.


	135. Wherein You Get Assaulted At The Mall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Stop trying to make tumblr happen?](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

It’s barely a week after the fiasco before Mettaton moves out. You’re not at all surprised - he seemed to be hanging around strictly for your benefit, trying to demonstrate that he’s fine, that everything’s fine, that this is all…

Fine. 

It’s not terribly convincing, of course. You know what (well, who) had been keeping him here, and, when it seems that Capra’s not changing his mind overnight about the whole we’re-over-until-I-somehow-fix-this thing, it doesn’t take long for Mettaton to move from denial to acceptance. Friday night, he packs his ridiculous little minibus - the one with pictures of his face printed all over it - full of his stuff. You’d had no idea he even _had_ so much stuff in this house, and have a moment where you feel depressed over your friend leaving, and then another moment where you feel almost equally depressed about his springform pan set leaving. Okay, that’s not fair, but…

Eh. It sucks. You get it, but it sucks. 

You still take a stab one last time, out in the driveway, saying your goodbyes. Mettaton is lingering by the driver’s door, occasionally glancing down the driveway like a certain stupid fancy electric car is going to roll up on its own. 

Of course, it doesn’t. 

“pal. you really don’t gotta go.” Sans says, and, god, you love him for it, he genuinely puts the effort in. He sounds like he means it. 

“Really.” You say, scuffing your super sneaky force-field shoe on the pavement. “We love you, Mettaton. You could stay.” 

Mettaton gives the both of you an affectionate look. “Darlings, you know I would, if things were different. But, well…”

“I know.” You sigh. “Just… don’t be a stranger, okay? Don’t make me teleport into your condo and drag you back here. We really do love you.”

“or at least like you.” Sans can’t help but chime in. You give him A Look, and he has the good sense to sigh, “‘m kidding, bud. we love ya.” 

“I promise.” Mettaton says, looking the tiniest bit amused. “I need to check up on my favorite tiny superstar, in any event.” Your brow furrows for a second, and you glance at Sans (is _he_ the tiny superstar?!) but then, of course, you realize he means the Dot and you give him a weak smile. 

“Be good?” You ask plaintively. 

“I’ll try.” He looks up the driveway one last time, and a resigned expression crosses his face. “Well. It… it’s time, anyway.” He heaves a sigh, and then steps forward to give you your expected hug. You feel the cool brush of metallic lips against your forehead, and then he’s moved onto Sans. Sans and Mettaton eye each other for a moment, but then Sans steps forward first to give Mettaton a hug - not a handshake. This, at least, makes Mettaton smile. 

He’s still smiling, just a little, as he gets in his vehicle. You doubt that smile makes it to the end of the road. 

Once you’re back inside, you turn to your fiance. “Thank you.” You say, leaning forward to give him a quick kiss. He blinks at you, perplexed. 

“uh, for what?”

“For being so nice to Mettaton. He needed it.” You explain. Sans smiles at you, a little sadly. 

“well. you love him, so… ugh. i hate this.” He finds his way back onto a familiar subject. “i’ve barely seen cap all week and when i did he looked like a mess, and… it just sucks, babe. i mean…”

“I know. He’s your best human friend.” You sigh. 

“besides you.” He says at once, which earns him another kiss. He’s smiling a little after that. “i’m so smooth.” He says, a little smugly. 

“Like silk.” You agree, eying his sharp contours with amusement. “Want to take Spot for a walk with me? Maybe a swim? I dunno how many more we’ll get this year. It was cold this morning.”   
“sure. a swim.” He agrees, smiling now. “or, uh… you know. whatever it is that i can do.” 

“A wade.” You say with a grin. 

“a sink.” He replies dryly, and tugs your hand, opening a shortcut upstairs to change.

“Oh my god you’re so lazy.” You scoff, stepping through, and make your way to the armoire, fishing out the literal only bikini you’d ever found that looked good on you.

Well. Looked, it turns out, is kind of the operative term. Pulling the top on, you let out a soft whine. 

“‘s the matter?!” He demands, whirling instantly - he’s still sensitive, just waiting for some adverse effect of Capra’s magic handoff to pop up. Then, seeing your conundrum, he snickers, arching his browbones. “uh. might not wanna go out like that.”

“Oh, is it too small?” You drawl sarcastically, making one last attempt to make the top _kind of_ cover you.

“uh. just. a… little.” He’s trying to be diplomatic. You scowl at him for a long moment, and he holds up his hands defensively. “hey! no complaints here.” 

“Yes, you’ve made that very clear.” You sigh, then purse your lips. “Mettaton would have had something for me. Seven somethings. He would have sewed something out of the curtains or something.” You say wistfully, then reluctantly begin tearing through your underwear drawer again. You’ve got a one piece in here somewhere that’ll _probably_ still fit. 

“...you’re pretty upset about all this, still, huh?” Sans notes, walking over to rest his hand on your back. You heave another sigh, then nod. 

“I hate it when people leave.” You say quietly. “Even Cap. I just felt like… I don’t know. That it was okay when we were all here. Safer.” Sans looks at you, then nods before moving his arm around you and nuzzling your neck.

“i know.” He admits. “and i know you don’t like people leaving, either.” 

“It’s stupid.” You sigh, leaning into his embrace and letting your eyes close. 

“no it’s not. you were all by yourself in this house for a long time.” He insists, reaching up to comb his fingers through your hair. “it’s not stupid.” He repeats.

“It’s just… I don’t know. This part really is stupid.” You warn him, moving away just enough to look at him. “I guess having Capra here… I mean, he was part of my old life. Before.” You say quietly. “It’s stupid. And he was pulling away way before mom and dad died, but… it just felt like while he was here, like they weren’t just… gone. I mean, that’s the thing, babe. Mom’s parents were dead, no siblings. Dad just had Paula, and well, you know how that turned out. They didn’t really have close friends, they had each other and they had work and… you know. For a while, Cap.” You say, then groan, shaking your head. “It really is so dumb. It’s not like they were back. It was just-”

“it’s not dumb.” Sans says again, more firmly, then studies you seriously. “god. sometimes, i have half a mind to punch that asshole in the face. he shoulda - he could have been there for you, when you were younger. then you plop back into his life, and you’re taking care of him -”

“Well, he needs it!”

“i know. the idiot.” He says, but it’s without malice. “i just wish… i wish someone had been there. lookin’ out for ya.”

“Yeah. I feel the same way about you.” You sigh, then look down at your top again, suddenly feeling the urge to giggle at how silly this conversation is when you’re falling out of a swimsuit designed for a totally-not-pregnant you. “Oh god. Maybe… shit, Sans, I think we need to go shopping.”

“hm?” He’s caught by surprise at the change of topic. 

“Aaron and Tommy’s wedding is tomorrow! If I don’t fit in this, I’m definitely not pulling off the dress I planned to wear. I was so worried about finding a suit to fit _you_ -”

“yeah, thanks for that. being surprised by capra’s creepy tailor, at work, mid-experiment… that ruled.” He says dryly. 

“- that I’ve got nothing myself. Damn. Damn damn.” You mutter, ignoring him. “Sorry, babe. I know you don’t love shopping.”

“i like hanging out with you. ‘s fine.” He insists. “i did, uh, kinda forget that their wedding was tomorrow, though.” 

“Yep.” You rub your forehead. “And then after them, it’s us, babe.”

“heh.” That puts the grin back on his face. “good. ‘s about time.”

“Oh, please. We haven’t even had our one year anniversary yet! You’re such a… monster.” You laugh, rolling your eyes. He doesn’t even say anything, just stares down at your exposed stomach very, very deliberately. “Okay. Point. You have a point.” You concede, rolling your eyes. “But that was an accident!”  
“a good accident.” He says smugly, and you grin. 

“Yeah. A good one. God… I wonder what my parents would have said, if they could have been here for this.”

“about you shacked up and pregnant and unmarried to a skeleton?” He teases, and you laugh and nod. 

“Yeah. You’ve got a way with words, you know that?” He grins, unrepentant. “But yeah. I like to think they’d have been happy.”

“you really think?” Sans says. You’ve shared this thought with him before, but he always seems skeptical. 

“That I’m marrying a man who loves me and cares for me and protects me, no matter what? A guy who’s going to be the most amazing dad on the planet-”

“shh, papyrus might hear, he thinks there’s an actual contest-”

“Oh, shh.” You laugh, then shake your head. “They’d be happy. They always were, if I was happy.” He looks up at you, at that, meeting your eyes.

“and you are happy? even with… you know. everything.” He asks, trying to sound nonchalant, but… well, you know him well enough by now to be certain he means it. You smile at him, embracing the fact that you’re going to finish this entire, semi-important conversation half shoved into a bikini top.

“I’m happy.” You say, and kiss him gently. He’s too focused on hearing what you’re saying to react in time, and your lips hit teeth and bone, not magic, but you don’t mind. “I’ve got you. Even if everyone else left. I’ve got you. And the Dot. That’s all I need. Well, I mean, as long as everyone stays friends with me, I’d be pretty upset if Papyrus or Undyne or Alphys just like, _left_ left-”

“yeah.” He laughs. “me too. but… yeah. i’m happy too. might wish things were different, but… i’m happy too.” 

\-------------------

Shopping takes longer than either of you would like - you end up getting a new dress and (when you see a woman side eying you for picking up another bikini) VERY DEFINITELY A NEW BIKINI, because fuck that noise. You’re walking out of the department store, feeling perky and swinging Sans’ hand, when the moment that you’ve been dreading ever since discovering your pregnancy finally occurs.  
Out of nowhere (well, out of the general vicinity of the Orange Julius) a woman turns to stare at you. She’s probably in her mid-forties, with big, curly hair, and she’s got a shopping bag in one hand, heavy makeup, and an intent expression on her face. 

It’s probably because you’re holding Sans’ hand. Ugh. Reflexively, you hold on a little tighter, looking plaintively at him. Generally, you cut shortcuts in spaces out of human eyesight - it just saves on hassle. Right now though-

“Excuse me.” 

Goddamn. It’s too late. The woman is already rushing towards you. Sans bristles next to you, shifting his weight - he’s already bracing for a fight, which seems a little silly. This lady seems more subsitute teacher than maniacal assassin. Still, neither of you are prepared for what she does next.

“You’re expecting!” She says happily, and she touches your belly.

She just touches your belly.

A perfect stranger has decided to come up and touch your belly. 

“She’s touching my belly.” You say out loud, bewildered. Sans stares at you.

“do, uh, humans do this?”

“Yes!” Exclaims the woman cheerfully. “Oh, you must be so happy!”

“...She’s touching my belly.” You repeat.

“uh. why are you touching her belly?” Sans asks the woman.

“To feel the baby kick!” She replies, like this is a perfectly good reason to come up to a stranger and just touch their belly.

“it can’t kick, she’s only-” Sans begins, but the woman cuts him off, suddenly looking at you, aghast.

“What on earth are you doing!?” She says, staring down at your hand. The one that you’ve just planted firmly on her abdomen.

“Oh.” You say, locking eyes with her. “I thought this is what we were doing. I thought that we were just two strangers, touchin’ bellies.” To emphasize this point, you give your fingers a little wiggle against the cotton of her t-shirt.   
The two of you remain locked in this position for a long moment. 

“Well!” She finally exclaims, and whirls away, looking absolutely indignant. You turn to look at your fiance, who’s already quietly snickering. 

“Home?” You beg. 

Shaking his head, he traces a doorway in the middle of the mall, and the two of you step home.

\-------------------------------------

You end up swimming at ten - or is it eleven? Time seems unimportant when it’s just the two of you out there, lazing in the calm, warm, dark waters and looking at the stars and the moon. Your fingers grow wrinkly, but all the same, it’s nice, for once, to let a few hours slip away, to just enjoy private time with Sans. When the two of you finally decide to get out of the water, though, the air is downright chilly, and again, you catch that scent of autumn, of drying leaves and dust and dirt. It’s the last hurrah, the last chance for nature to get ready before that long, cold period of stagnation around the corner.

And for the first time in, well, quite some time, your mind wanders to plants. To seeds.

You wonder what might be lying in the ground, waiting for its chance to grow.


	136. Wherein the Wedding Gets Totally Ruined

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [come 2 me my children of the night?](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“hey look. i look hot. don’t i look hot? look at how hot i look.” Sans admires himself in the mirror yet again. 

“Yes, honey, you look very very hot.” You say distractedly, trying to remember why you’d thought false eyelashes were a good idea, and nudging him a little with your elbow to free up some space in front of the mirror. The two of you need a bigger bathroom. (Of course, there’s a solution - you could move into the master bedroom, the one with the adjacent room that could _totally_ be a nursery, and the big, good, super good bathroom with the jacuzzi… but you don’t, because that was your parents’ room, and it still just seems weird and wrong, somehow). 

“never had a suit that fit before.” He’s definitely smug.

“Well, just remember, you need to hold that shape all night or it won’t fit. Which means that you probably-”

“shouldn’t have a lot to drink because i start doing practical jokes and you don’t want my pants falling down if i get distracted.” He finishes your thought, and you roll your eyes. 

“You act like it’s an impossibility.”

“doesn’t happen with basketball shorts. elastic waist.” 

“Oh!” Your eyes widen, and you wince, immediately closing them again. It’s too late. The false eyelash has migrated to directly under your eyebrow. “Is that why you always wear those?”

“uh, yeah. well, that and i’m always ready to do sweet dunks.” You have to turn and look at him. 

“I have literally never seen you play basketball.” 

“well, we don’t have a hoop.” He says, as if that’s totally obvious.

“Would you like one? Actually, you know, the tennis courts out back don’t get any use at all. I mean, even mom and dad didn’t use them. We could see if it’s in the budget to get that paved so you have a place to play?” 

“really?!” He looks astonished, and you roll your eyes.

“Uh, yeah, bonehead. It’s your house too. And we never spend money on anything but food these days, and Cap’s still paying you those mad bucks. Let’s do it!”

“money will be tighter with the baby.” He warns, and you nod. 

“No kidding. But… let’s do this, babe. I want you to be happy.”

“i already am.” 

“Okay, fine. Happier. Every single day, I want you to be happier.” You say with a grin, then look back at the mirror, groan, and give up on your falsies entirely, yanking the other one off. “Forget that. I grow my own eyelashes. How do I look?” You turn to face him, then snicker. “C’mon, stop giving me those gooey heart eyes.”

“nah.” He says lazily, then leans up to kiss you, that familiar crackle of magic against your lips that will probably always make your heart stutter. “i love you”

“I love you too. Wanna see if everyone’s ready to go?”

“yeah.” He takes your hand, kisses it, and then the two of you meander out of the bathroom to see if all your friends are ready for Aaron and Tommy’s wedding. 

\----------------------------------------

Papyrus, it turns out, owns a powder blue zoot suit, and he wears it better than anyone has ever worn a zoot suit before. When you go downstairs, he eyes Sans’ (staid, black, Capra-influenced) suit with unmasked disdain. 

“THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE A FANCY WEDDING!” He protests. “AT LEAST THE HUMAN KNOWS ABOUT PROPER ATTIRE.” 

This, of course, makes you immediately second guess what you’re wearing (which, as far as you can tell, is a pretty normal dress. Is it too… boob-y? Well, goddamn, it felt like everything was these days and you still had months of pregnancy to go and…. Okay. This was besides the point.) Sans sees the look on your face and snickers, then lets out a half-assed wolf whistle as Undyne and Alphys come down the stairs. Well, actually, what he says is,

“weet woo.” You figure that’s his best effort at wolf whistling and merely roll your eyes, absently scratching a whining Spot, who’s nuzzling up against you. She had fun splashing in and out of the waves with you last night, but you can’t just bring her to the wedding. You’re feeling guilty, of course. She’s been spending a lot of nights in the family room instead of at the foot of your bed, because Sans has been… enthusiastic about the way you look. That’s a way to put it. 

“Look at you dorks!” Undyne crows, and you grin. 

“Uh, look at you!” Undyne’s wearing a spectacular sequined red mermaid dress - well, kind of, she’s already torn one of the seams nearly up to her upper thigh, which sort of makes sense for her. Especially with the combat boots peeking out beneath the frills at the bottom. All the same, it almost looks like it was done on purpose, and Alphys is looking at her in a way that gives you renewed hope that the Dot might have some little geeky friends to play around with in a few months. Alphys, too, looks very pretty - she’s wearing a flower crown and a dress with cherry blossoms printed onto it, and she looks very, very happy. 

“L-let’s go! I c-can’t wait to see everyone!” She says brightly, still smiling, and you grin at her.

“‘k.” Sans says, distracted by the invitation he’s fished out of his pocket, then looks up. “oh, heh. alph, you surprised me.” 

“I k-know.” She says sheepishly. “I s-should try to dress up more often, it’s just-”

“what? no.” Sans scoffs. “you just show when you’re happy. you gotta be excited about this wedding.”

“Um. Yes. And uh, er, A-asgore… s-said I d-didn’t need to k-keep working on his p-project. It’s a w-weight off my s-shoulders.”

“What project is that?” You ask, tracing a doorway distractedly to the Country Ridge Country Club (which seems more than a little redundant, namewise). She looks at you, blushes, then shrugs. 

“T-top s-secret.” She stutters, then looks up at Undyne with big, adoring eyes. “Coming, sweetie?” She says, and steps through the portal first. Undyne looks at all of you, shrugs, then follows her wife. 

Welp. You shrug as well and step through the portal, trusting Sans to herd his brother through, and then rock back on your heels. 

Either Tommy’s rich, or Aaron’s rich. Maybe they’re both rich. Maybe Tommy’s family is rich. Hell, maybe Aaron’s family… well. You have no idea how this happened, but you do know, immediately, that this wedding is way fancier than yours will ever be. Your feet hit the grass on the other side of the shortcut, and almost immediately - like, within milliseconds - a uniformed human caterer is handing you a glass of cucumber water, as if people step out of thin air all the time in front of him. 

“Right this way.” He says, unperturbed, pointing down a gravel path (strewn with white petals) to an enormous seating arrangement; white chairs upon white chairs, all wrapped in decorative tulle, all pointing at a floral arch on the beach.

“yikes.” Mutters Sans. He’s stepped after you - and similarly had a glass of cucumber water shoved into his hand - and is now looking a little worried. “our wedding is not gonna be-”

“Anywhere near this big. Or this nice.” You sigh, resigned. He winces, but you shake your head. “This is too big for us anyway. We want small, right? Intimate?”

“yeah.” He sounds relieved, but then Papyrus, behind you, pipes up;

“WELL, THIS IS MUCH MORE IN KEEPING WITH MONSTER TRADITION! MONSTERS THINK WEDDINGS ARE A GOOD THING! OH! LOOK! MY FRIEND!” He spots someone in the crowd and tears off, just as you begin to argue that humans also think that weddings are a good thing, it’s just that expenses exist and…

“oh well.” Sans sighs, and takes your hand. “c’mon babe. lessee if there’s anyone here you haven’t met that i can show you off to.”

“Blerg.” You reply, but part of you does like that, that even though you’re already feeling weird in your body, Sans is eager to brag to his friends from the underground that he’s with you.

Everyone’s in attendance, it feels like. As you walk towards the spot the ceremony is being held, over and over again you have to stop to greet monsters - and people - you’ve met over the past year. Grillby greets you with a very cheerful wave and a hissing pronouncement in fire-speech that his favorite customers had finally arrived. Some Whimsuns cluster around you next, all beaming - you remember a few of them from your New Year’s party. 

There are monsters here like you’ve never even seen or imagined, though. A giant spider - oh, Muffet, you’d met her briefly with the rest of the spider clan, the night last spring when the humans attacked - comes skittering in for a six armed hug that leaves you breathless, cooing as she strokes your hair and exclaims how happy she is to see you. This is, you know, fine. When she’s done looking you over and leaning in close to examine the Dot, though, she makes a last little fuhuhuhu of happiness and then leans back to grab something, oh god, from her… butt?

“A veil, dearie! For when it’s your turn!” She purrs, handing you… oh god, it’s actually beautiful, intricate silk that’s been twisted and woven into gorgeous lacework, and you…

“Uh.. wow! Thank you!” You exclaim, picking the thing that had just come out of her butt up, and then slapping an even wider smile on your face. 

(Sans, the asshole, snickers). 

“Of course, dearie! Be seeing you!” Muffet coos, and turns, ducking neatly under a perturbed looking airplane monster - you didn’t even know those existed! You glance at Sans.

‘that was nice of her.” He’s the king of straight faces. You narrow your eyes, but a second later, Papyrus is at your side, bouncing like an eager puppy. 

“LOOK WHO I FOUND!” He enthuses.

He’s found Capra. Well, kind of. You can’t remember the last time.. well, no, Capra had never looked this bad. His hair is wild - it looks like he’s made a game attempt to tame it, but no, it just isn’t sticking and he’s got… god, what are those things called? Flyaways? It’s been so long since you’ve seen Cap without his hair slicked back that it takes you a while to remember that yes, when Capra was a college student, his hair had been long and, er, leonine.  
The rest of him isn’t doing much better. He’s lost weight - and he was already skinny - and he’s got dark circles under his eyes. His scar on his face is standing out bright, which you realize, after a second, is only the case because the rest of him is so pale. Even his suit - and it has to be one of the same suits, you swear to god, you’ve seen him wear this exact suit! - looks wrinkled and hangs off him weirdly. 

“...cap.” Sans begins, looking a little alarmed, himself. 

“Guys!” Capra feigns enthusiasm. “I didn’t know you’d be…” He trails off to yawn, and you shake your head. 

“Uh. Yeah. Us either. You know Tommy and Aaron?”

“Well… sure. They invited everyone.” He yawns, and nods at the crowd once more. He’s not wrong, you suppose. Still…

“How have you been, Cap?” This makes him look up from his reflection at the crowd. He glances you over, holds his hand over his mouth to conceal a yawn, and then says, deliberately;

“Busy.” 

“you don’t look like you’ve been eating-”

“I’m fine.” Capra interjects, then turns abruptly to the front of the arrangement of chairs, his eyes distant. You see why, a second later. Mettaton is making his way down the aisle. 

“ah, jeez.” Sans mutters.

“WHAT?” Papyrus demands, but then it’s already over; Mettaton casts another glance at you, but then spots a tall, beautiful robot in the crowd and makes his way over to them. 

“Who’s that?” Capra, who you could swear hadn’t even looked back, hisses. 

“his cousin. relax.” Sans sighs. 

“Relax? What if this is some Game of Thro-”

Capra’s cut off as the processional begins to play, and a beaming Aaron and Tommy make their way down the center aisle to, in monster tradition, raucous applause.  
\-------------------------------

The ceremony is beautiful. So beautiful, in fact, that you hope your fiance is taking copious notes. The groomsmen on both sides are wonderful, the music is _perfect_ , and before the two have even exchanged rings and kissed each other, the caterers have positioned themselves with fingerfood and cocktails, ready for the swarm of hungry guests.

“oh god, we can’t afford this.” Sans mutters once, under his breath. “not unless we give up the-”

“You’re getting your basketball thingy.” You say firmly, then bounce to your feet, applauding, as the newly married couple walk (and drift) down the aisle. 

You’re braced for some more awkward moments after that, because when Capra stands up, you can see that he makes eye contact with Mettaton. The two of them actually seem to hold that for quite some time, before Capra abruptly turns back to you and Sans. 

“Can, uh, can someone take me… you know. Home.” He says quietly. “Or at least to my car.” Sans looks at him for a long moment, taking in his expression, then sighs. 

“sure. after you’ve eaten your dinner, though. they did, you know, pay for it.” 

Capra glances at the crowd again - Mettaton’s turned his back - then lets out a heavy sigh. 

“Fine.”  
\--------------------------

This turns out to be a bad idea. It’s a bad idea because Mettaton is at your table, and Capra is not. It’s a worse idea because almost immediately after Mettaton sits down, his cousin - Napstablook - calls him up to help them with the music, to a round of outrageously enthusiastic applause. Capra stabs at his salad, making (by your approximation) the saltiest face of all time. It isn’t until the dessert is served and Mettaton hops up to sing that Capra loses his whole cool though. He turns to you and Sans, giving you an utterly pathetic face. 

“fine.” Sans sighs, and grabs Capra’s wrist - the guy’s been abusing the open bar - escorting him behind a potted plant to get him home. You watch them leave, and then are startled by a soft touch on your back. 

“Who-” You begin, whirling, then relax. “Oh! Lawyerpants! Long time no see!” 

“Tell me about it.” The handsome cat purrs. “Just wanted to stop by and say hi.” 

“Oh! Well, hi!” You laugh. “How are things with you and your… er, human?”

“Good. Great.” He laughs, then jerks his head. “My cousin and your friend wanna know if you’re free to say hi, but they’re both too shy to-”

“Oh my god.” You laugh, spotting the culprits. “They’re silly.” You look at Sans, who’s returning from the nook. “Be right back, babe. I gotta talk to Nat and Shadow. And then you’re shit out of luck, because it’s embarrassing dance time.”

“you really don’t know me at all.” He snorts. “i’m the king of embarrassing dances. so. felix. how’s work, bud?” 

As Sans and Lawyerpants begin to talk, you make your way over, across the dancefloor, to your friends. “Hey!” You exclaim. “I didn’t even see you!”

“You were preoccupied.” Nat laughs, then looks at you again, quickly. “Holy hell, you are actually pregnant, aren’t you.”

“...Uh, yup. Please don’t touch my belly though-”

“Why would we? Baby can’t even kick yet.” Shadow says loftily, then grins at you, all sharp, pointy, gleaming teeth. “Hey.” 

“Hey yourself!” You laugh. “Man, this is some party, huh?”

“The appetizers?” Nat glows. “The… god, when I tell people I was at a private concert with Napstablook and Mettaton…” 

“I know.” You laugh. “It’s great.”

“Not a lot of humans here, though.” Shadow notes, then distractedly licks the back of his paw.

“...Yeah.” You sigh. “Humans are-”

“Learning.” Nat says optimistically, leaning against Shadow. He gets the message and hugs Natalie close for a second. Nat sighs, leaning up to kiss his jaw, and then looks back at you. “Shit, though, you’re totally next.” 

“...Yep. Yes I am.” You sigh. “And I’ve got a million things I haven’t done - shit, need to do -” Capra’s rapping founding fathers have infested your brain. 

“Just you wait.” Nat chimes in helpfully, then shrugs. “Well. I’m totally a bridesmaid. What can I do?” 

You hadn’t elected, like, any other bridesmaids, but, well, she’s right. She’s a bridesmaid. Thinking of the cold last night and your morbid thoughts, you feel your brow furrow. “You could, uh, help me pick out flowers tomorrow?

“Oh! Fun!” Natalie says, but then Shadow turns to her, nonchalant. Well, deliberately nonchalant. You’ve had Ghost long enough to know a cat’s body language. 

“We’ve got that thing tomorrow, doll.” He purrs. 

“Oh!” Natalie looks startled. “Right.” She looks apologetically at you. “Later this week?” 

“Of course.” You laugh, then glance over your shoulder, checking on Sans. “Well. I’d better…”

“Sure.” Natalie and Shadow say at once, totally suspiciously. “Have fun!” Natalie adds.

Walking back to your fiance, you have to wonder exactly what has the two of them so jumpy that they feel the need to lie really, really, poorly at you. 

Maybe it’s better if you don’t know.


	137. Wherein We Focus on Non-OCs, For A Change (Am I Right?)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Fanfic blog you'll be too embarrassed to tell your friends you follow, a-right this way!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“Ow, _shit!_ ”

“Be careful! You can’t break anything!”

“That pot just lunged out at me!”

“No. That’s not a thing. And I thought you could see really well in the dark!”

“I can see great in the dark, when some _human_ isn’t waving a giant flashlight around!”

“Well, I can’t see without it, so…”

This wasn’t exactly ideal. This certainly wasn’t what Natalie (and, well, probably Shadow too) wanted to be doing, the day after an enormous wedding where they’d both had too much to eat and drink. They deserved to be writhing around on the couch complaining about their headaches and watching cartoons. 

People didn’t always get what they deserved, though. 

“Look.” She tries again. “I just want to keep poking deeper. There’s definitely at least one more chamber in this system I haven’t even gone in, yet, but if it’s something that can help Peter-”

“He needs it.” Shadow drawls, licking the back of his paw and running it over his ear in a distracted, self soothing motion. “I don’t like caves. God, I don’t like caves. I took an EbbCo job because Capra promised me absolutely no caves.”

“I told you I can do this on my own-”

“Like hell.” It’s already an argument that they’ve had time to break in; they barely need to look at each other in the dim light before they smile, realizing the futility of continuing. He’d point out that there was no cell reception down here, that humans had totally died in caves alone because of that lack of reception, or falling in a hole, or any of the thousand other things that could happen in a cave. 

“Well.” She sighs, then nods at the arch of darkness that denote the next room. “Let’s just keep truckin’. Though, um. Fair. Warning. This next room... “

“Uh oh.” Shadow’s tail lashes. It’s only been a few months of dating, but he knows that tone of voice when she speaks up, and it makes her cringe. 

“It’sspookyandgrossandIhateitI’msorry-” She lets out in a rush, and Shadow snickers.

“How bad can it be?” He laughs, arching his back. “It’ll be fine.” And with that, he saunters into the darkness of the next chamber, leaping nimbly over a small cache of ancient pots as he does so.

Goddamn it, that’s just like him. Well. See if she cares. See if she warns him about spooky murals ever again. He’s on his own in the mural department-

“Woah.” Shadow interrupts her train of thought, and she almost runs directly into him, stopping short at the last second. “What the…”

“I tried to warn you.” She sighs, though seeing those figures again - the depiction of humans gathering monster blood like it was a harvest, like a monster was nothing but an animal… her stomach turns, and she feels a vague stab of misplaced guilt. This wasn’t her fault, of course! She’d never do anything like what was splashed all over this wall in gory detail! She didn’t need to feel bad just because some humans, sometime in the past, might have....

“Uh. Whaaaat am I looking at here?” Shadow sounds too calm, but the tip of his tail is twitching regularly now - a bad sign. 

“I know. I know. It’s... yeah.” She sighs, bites her lip, then says. “Uh. I’m really not supposed to tell anyone. But I think my boyfriend who’s helping me on this stupid mission is probably an okay exception to the rule. So. It’s. Okay. So here’s the thing.” She gets stuck, and rubs her forehead, feeling anxious.

“Are they torturing that monster?” Shadow asks, stepping closer.

“Um. Kind of. Yes. Um. But that wasn’t… okay. Let me start over.” She sighs. “So, underground, back before the barrier fell, you guys had lots of legends and stuff about humans being able to do magic, right?”

“Right…” Shadow says cautiously. 

“Well. After the barrier went up, it seems like human mages vanished pretty fast. Like, we never took the idea seriously in school, even with the barrier. Nobody but EbbCo ever really studied it. Nobody even wanted to call it _magic_ , because we thought that it was ridiculous that magic would even exist. I mean, nobody even believed monsters were real, and now… well. You get it.” She says, twisting her bracelet around her wrist anxiously. 

“Sure. I’m not getting it.” Shadow sounds a little more relaxed (which is to say, less of the fake calm is in his voice) but his tail is still twitching.

“Well. It turns out that humans don’t make their own magic. But they were getting it from _somewhere_ and-”

“Ohhh.” Shadow says, and then winces as the full impact of what Natalie had just told him hits him. “Oh, fuck.” 

“...Are you okay?” Natalie breathes.

“I think I’m gonna be… fuck. Fuck. Nat. Those humans who kidnapped those monsters last year, they were taking their blood. Does that mean there’s a human who… Oh, fuck, your friend, is she part of this, does Sans-”

“NO! No. No. No no no. Nothing… nothing like that. She’s made that pretty clear. She gets her magic from, uh… other…” She trails off again, suddenly exhausted by this whole conversation. 

Shadow’s eyes widen, and for a split second, he gets that very annoying look on his face that he gets when he’s heard something particularly good. He can’t restrain himself. “So is it, uh, all monster bodily fluids or am I misinterpreting-”

“Please don’t spread this around. She’ll actually kill me.” Nat whines.

“Well, I guess we know _you’re_ not a mage now.” 

“Shadow.” He’s smart enough to hear that tone of finality, though he still looks spectacularly amused. She’s growing very fond of that spectacularly amused look, but she doesn’t exactly want to tell him that right now. And, well… as he looks back at the mural, the amusement fades.

“Do the humans know about this?” He asks. “Like, all of them?” 

“I don’t know.” She mutters. “I mean, I know. And Doris Aberdeen apparently does. _______ knows. And Peter, I assume. But the way I hear… whatever happened that night, under EbbCo-”

“Down here.” Shadow chimes in, glancing over his shoulder.

“Ugh, you’re right.” She thinks about that, shivers, then recalls her point. “Anyway. Whatever it was, they’re still trying to figure out what criminal treatment to give all the humans who were there. I gotta think at least some of them know about this…”

“I don’t like that.” Shadow says quietly, and she shivers again. 

“Me neither.” She admits, then looks up at him. “But… hey, at least we’re working for one of the good guys, right? Peter sent me down here to find out how to stop a human mage.”

“Cut off their access to monster blood, apparently.” Shadow says, very dryly, then sighs. “You’re right. I’m just… worried. Things have been so quiet recently. And Capra’s looking like shit. What if he knows something we don’t?”

“I guess… ugh. We just gotta trust him.” She sighs, then turns to study her boyfriend. He still looks a little spooked - his ears aren’t flat against his head, but are somewhere in that region. “I’m sorry. I should have warned you about this-”

“No. It’s fine. I just… fuck, I hate being underground. Especially, obviously, in the creepiest damn room I’ve ever seen.” 

“Well, let’s get out of this chamber at least. It gives me the willies.” She admits, and reaches for his paw, squeezing it reassuringly. 

Both of them give the slab in the center of the room a wide berth as they move past it. Nat tries very, very hard to not look at it, suspecting that her mind will conjure up traces of red that couldn’t be there. Right? Right. Time to focus on the next…

“Is this a dead end?” She asks, glancing around. There doesn’t seem to be any other doors into the cave, just the one they’d come through, and regular, sloping, damp cave walls. 

“It can’t be. We excavated into one side, remember? There wasn’t a way in before we punched through. And people have clearly been in here before, so this cave system has to have an outlet all the way to the surface.” Shadow says rationally. “But, you’re right, I can’t… hang on.” He closes his eyes, his mouth open just a little as he inhales. He turns once, a few degrees, and does the same thing, his whiskers twitching, then paces over to a portion of the wall. “Well. Shit. Nat, come look!” He says. Her brow furrows in confusion, but she hurries over, pointing her flashlight at the spot he’d chosen. 

 

“I don’t see anything?” She says quietly, and Shadow, eyes very wide now, reaches for the wall.

His paw slides directly through.

“It’s an illusion. It’s a _good_ one.” He sounds, reluctantly, a little impressed. 

“Did a human do that?” Nat asks, bewildered. 

“I mean… it would have to be, right? Do human spells last that long?” He says, peering closer. 

“You’re asking ME?” 

“Okay. Okay. Fair point.” He sniffs again, then looks at her. “Doesn’t smell like humans, at least. But… well, nothing down here smells like anything but limestone.” He hesitates for another moment, then shrugs and steps through the false wall into-

“Shadow! What the hell!?” She yelps, surprised and upset. 

“It’s fine!” He calls back.

“What if there was like a trap or something?!”

“There wasn’t!” He says, then adds, a second later. “Come through, though, I’ve got no idea what I’m looking at.” 

She hesitates, biting her lip, then bites the bullet and steps quickly through the illusion into…

This chamber is lit.

It nearly sends her into a panic until she understands what she’s seeing - there are phosphorescent stones that glow brightly in certain veins throughout Mt. Ebott. You even have one set as your engagement ring. This room had been cunningly lit with what must be hundreds of thousands of them, lining the ceiling in polished slices, which had the effect of making the space nearly as bright as daylight. 

Well, that’s one mystery solved. But the contents of this room…

“What is this?” Shadow asks again, and she shakes her head. 

“I have no idea.” 

There are machines she’s never seen the like of before, tarnished brass and silver, set with crystal lenses in strange, circular patterns… something that looks very much like a distillery, dusty glassware that was used for indecipherable means… a rotting antique desk - that was probably a desk? - and chair, both covered with decomposing remnants of what was once, perhaps, paper…

And still more machines, and stranger things. A pewter stein on the only uncollapsed shelf of a dilapidated, empty, bookcase. An inkwell. A small stone statue of a fox. A rusted cage that, maybe, once held a small rodent.

“This… this is newer, though, right?” Shadow says, picking carefully through the debris.

“I mean… I think so? The desk and bookcase and stuff… that could only be like… god, two hundred years, tops… maybe less, in this humidity. I’ve never… huh. I’ve never seen anything like this.” She mutters, watching as Shadow begins to prowl around the small chamber. He reaches the desk, and picks up a moldering scrap of paper. 

“Huh. It’s in… an old monster language, I think. Is this written… fire speech, maybe?”

“There’s writing!?” She hurries to his side, and then immediately feels foolish when she, naturally, can’t decipher the scrap in his hand. 

“I think it says… something something ‘purchase delay’ something something… ‘cocoa beans?’ Can that be right?” He says, and passes her the scrap; she quickly grabs a ziplock and stores it safely away. “Look, here’s another with writing…” He’s pushing through the scraps in a way that makes her archaeology instincts scream, but most of the papers are too far gone with mildew and rot as it is. “Um… ‘test subject… vanished… enormous… inhos...hospital?’ He pauses. “No. ‘Inhospitable.’ Something something… ‘skull, genus _Capra_ …. skeletal.’” He pauses. “Capra???”

“...Skeletal?” Natalie has focused on a different portion. Shadow thinks on this for a moment, then nods.

“Well. I, um, think we know who to ask about this, right?”


	138. In Which You Stay In Bed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, I glove you.   
> It's love for the emotionally unavailable. 
> 
> [o bby u u got wut i need](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

You’re enjoying your Sunday morning after the wedding as, obviously, god intended it - you’re sleeping the hell in. It’s… well, it’s actually kind of nice, really, having all the fun of the wedding without the slight hangover the next day, and when you finally crack your eyes open, at nearly eleven in the morning, you decide to just lie there and enjoy this.

Sans, as usual, has decided to be the big spoon. He’s got his heavy arm thrown over you, and he’s snoring in a way that is probably only cute because you’re in love with him, especially since you’re almost a hundred percent sure he doesn’t strictly _need_ to snore - wasn’t snoring like, something going on with your throat or sinuses or something? He doesn’t have any of that. And yet…

Oh well. He’s not the only one snoring. Ghost, for once, has deigned to sleep with you guys rather than Papyrus, and is currently sprawled halfway across both you and Sans, monopolizing a sunbeam neatly and letting out the occasional quiet kitty snort. And then, of course, there’s Spot, occupying the entire foot of the bed. She never sleeps, not really, but she does drift into quiet, contented, sort of low-energy mode, occasionally letting out a peaceful grumble. 

For the moment, you just take this in. You won’t have many more mornings like this, you suspect. Not that, well, you know What To Expect When You’re Expecting (A Hybrid Monster/Human Thingy), but you’re just not lucky enough to have the one newborn on the planet that doesn’t cry. Besides, Sans had said that even Papyrus had cried a lot, as a baby, so that was probably a pretty fair assumption.

You shift slightly, deciding that you can just stay here for, like, fifteen more minutes, right? Sans seems to agree; when you move, he mumbles and pulls you closer in his sleep, his hand drifting up to cup your breast. Heh. You wonder vaguely if you’ll ever be mature enough to not find that move of his funny, then close your eyes again.

You’re almost back asleep when, faintly - oh no - the doorbell rings.

Spot immediately leaps to attention, whining and pressing hard against the door with her snout, which sends Ghost into an alarmed panic. Scrambling away, he gets a paw stuck in Sans’ ribs and Sans wakes with a noise like he’s just gotten the wind knocked out of him, and down a floor, you can hear the sound of L.D.’s very enthusiastic barks as he goes to investigate who’s just arrived.

“help…” Sans says pathetically as Ghost flails, and you quickly leaning over, freeing the elderly cat and then sitting up once he’s on the floor. 

“You okay?” You check, relaxing slightly as you hear Undyne greeting someone in the foyer. Well. Probably not that much of a disaster of an unexpected guest. Hey, maybe it was Capra, come to his senses! ...Well, probably not, but it didn’t sound bad, so that was still technically a win. 

“yeah.” Sans says, rubbing his ribs, then yawns. “that feels gross though.”

“I know.” You remind him, tapping your skarm - there’s been a few misplaced kitty paws there as well, enough that you know he hadn’t had the most pleasant start to his morning. “Sounds like we’ve got a visitor, babe.”

“mmm, maybe it’s undyne’s friend. maybe we can stay here.” He says hopefully, ignoring Spot’s whine for the moment like if he doesn’t acknowledge it, he doesn’t have to move. 

“Maybe it’s Tori and Frisk. They’d be early, but…” You yawn, and then giggle as he pulls you back down, kissing your neck. 

“morning.” He says properly, and you smile, kissing his forehead. 

“Morning.” You murmur. “You were snoring.”

“yeah, i’m practicing dad stuff.” He says, in that tone you’ve never managed to work out if it’s a joke or not. “speaking of which,” He shifts slightly, then addresses your stomach. “hi, dot.”

“They’re not really a dot anymore.” You point out, smiling even wider.

“their soul looks beautiful today.” Sans says, that tone of awe still creeping into his voice.

“We did a good job making it.” You agree smugly, admiring the emerald green color - it was just getting big enough that you thought you were able to make out those slight shifts in color that you so often saw in their father’s soul. 

“heh-” Sans begins, a mischievous look crossing his face, before Undyne’s voice suddenly sounds from the other side of your door;

“NERDS! WAKEY WAKEY! NATALIE AND SHADOW ARE HERE TO SEE YOU!”

“OKAY!” You yell back wryly, and then look at Sans. “Did we say we were hanging out with them today?”

“we’re supposed to be tutoring frisk today.” Sans says with a shrug. “uh… well. lessee what they need.” 

 

The two of you get dressed quickly, and you finally trace a doorway to free poor Spot, stepping through behind her into the foyer. 

“Mother of-” Shadow says with a start as the bear sized skull abruptly appears in front of him.

“Hey Spot!” Nat coos, rushing forward to give her a scratch. 

“You know that thing?” Shadow says, still alarmed.

“Uh, yeah, it’s her pet. Hey guys! Why the hell is your phone off?” Natalie demands. You blink. 

“...My phone’s off?” 

“you, uh, mighta… left it… outside last night.” Sans says. “um. by the pool. with your dress.”

You give him A Look, then sigh and turn back to Shadow and Nat, taking them in again. “Uh oh.” You say quietly, this time noticing the smears of reddish mud on their clothes, the heavy boots Natalie’s wearing that you’ve seen too many times before, and the soaked fur on Shadow’s paws. “Guys, you didn’t.” You look up at Nat. “You said you weren’t gonna go back there!” 

She pouts prettily, sticking out her bottom lip. “Who says I went back there?”

“We did, though.” Shadow reminds her, and she rolls her eyes. 

“Well… okay, but Peter asked us to!”

“Well, if Capra asked you to jump off a bridge…” You begin, and then trail off, thinking that one through. “Um, when did he ask you to?” 

“Right after he broke up with Mettaton.” She says with a shrug, and you and Sans exchange a glance. “He said he’s looking for something that can stop a human mage.” 

“...welp. that makes sense.” Sans drawls, then looks more interestedly between the two of them. “did you find something?!”

“Well… kind of.” Shadow says, glancing at Nat again. 

“What is it?” You demand, feeling a little anxious. 

They look between each other again, and Nat speaks up. 

“We have no idea.”   
\---------------------------------------------------

“huh.” 

You’d cut a doorway to that creepy ass room with the even creepier-ass mural, and Sans (who hadn’t seen it yet) is immediately in full science investigation mode. He studies the mural, then the slab, then looks around the room again. “what’s in the pots?” He asks.

“Dunno. Nat said not to open them-”

“Curiosity. Killed. The cat.” She says pointedly, then sighs. “It’s not really procedure, I’d be contaminating any sample so - oh, okay, go ahead, just open one, that’s fine…” Her sarcasm is palpable. Not that anyone pays her any heed; Sans is already crouching down by one, carefully lifting the top. He stares into it for a second, then abruptly puts the lid back on. 

“What’s in there?” Shadow asks, pacing over. 

“nothing.” Sans’ tone is definitive. “waste of time. c’mon, show me the other room.” 

You know when he’s lying, of course. While Nat and Shadow walk him over to the wall with the concealed door, you, too, gingerly open a pot. For a second, you don’t see the big deal. It’s just dust. 

Then, oh. No. This is not dust, this is Dust. You replace the lid, looking around the room at once. All those jars, in this room, the last, the one before that…. oh, you feel sick. Quickly, you move to their sides, catching up with them, and immediately reach out for Sans’ hand, seeking reassurance. He squeezes back a bit harder than usual; he’s spooked too. 

As you pass through the illusion into the next room, though, his eyes go wide. 

“This is a lab, right?” Shadow’s saying. “But I’ve never seen anything like -”

“i have.” Sans says, moving over to the machine that’s all hoops of tarnished brass and intricate lenses. He studies it for a second, looking back and forth at the hoops, at some schema etched into the ground, at the polished lightsource of glowing rocks above, then grabs a hoop, pulling it into a position that clearly makes sense to him. 

“Oh, I don’t think we should be… yeah, you’re touching that.” Nat sighs, looking regretfully at the dust (thankfully, this was the lowercase variety) that begins to drift from the machine as Sans works busily, arranging the circles, the lenses until he’s formed a rough archway.

“there.” He says, and Shadow snorts.

“Am I supposed to know what this-”  
Sans turns, rolling his eyes, and then carefully alligns one final lens. 

For a second, nothing happens, and then-

The space in the rough archway flickers once, twice, and suddenly it snaps into clear focus; an endless plain of colors that can’t be, in geometrical patterns that don’t make sense, lurching and swirling in dizzying, irregular waves.

“What.” Shadow mutters, stepping closer - distractedly, you raise up your hand, blocking him. 

“Trust me, you don’t want to go in there.” You mutter. 

“I think I’m gonna be sick.” Nat whispers, turning away and holding her mouth to her hand, breathing hard. Shadow keeps staring into that space, though, jolting back with a startled yowl as an enormous shape drifts past the doorway. Sans absently reaches in the arch to give the gigantic Gaster Blaster a quick scratch, before turning back to study the equipment that had opened the portal once more. 

“home sweet home.” He says, sounding a little spooked, himself.   
\--------------------------------------------------

You get Sans to disassemble the machine after it seems like Natalie’s genuinely going to be sick at the strange sight of the void. You can hardly blame her - as you recall, pre-skarm, it had the same effect on you. Part of him clearly wants to stay and look into this, but another part wants nothing more than to get you right the hell out of there. 

The latter half wins out. You look at your phone, realize that Toriel and Frisk will be over soon, and then look at Sans, who’s taking a second pass at investigating every scrap of paper, every object, every mouldering invoice.

“Babe, we-”

“yeah. we should go.” He says at once, then looks up at Nat and Shadow. “guys, i don’t think your answer is down here.”

“Why’s that?” Natalie asks at once. 

“because i’ve seen labs like this before. they belonged to a monster. i know him… pretty damn well. and he’s locked up now because he couldn’t keep his hands off shit like this.” He scowls after a second, and places his hand on a crumbling section of wall. “looks like there was a cave-in here, anyway. this is the end of the line.”

“Okay, but… genus Capra?” Shadow asks, and Sans snorts.

“it means goat. i think you saw our girl spot at home. what does she look like, to you?”

“Ohhhhhh….” Natalie and Shadow say in unison. Natalie looks around the room again, then sighs. 

“Shit. I was really hoping I was onto something.”

“it happens.” Sans says consolingly, and you nod. “come on back to our place. you guys can grab lunch with the kiddo. you like grilled cheese?”

As it turns out, they do. You only barely make it back in time before Toriel and Frisk show up (Toriel’s hauling a basket with an enormous braided challah that’s actually both taller and wider than Frisk). Shadow, new to the house, moves around awkwardly in the kitchen, trying to be helpful as Undyne and Papyrus and Alphys all get to work making lunch. Toriel, in the meantime, is busily asking Nat all about human medicine and her “robot” knees. Nat looks a little overwhelmed to be talking to royalty, but soon enough finds her stride, eventually bounding up from her seat with a wince to smack Shadow’s paw as it creeps towards a pen on the kitchen island. He gives her an injured look, and she rolls her eyes at him. 

“He’s constantly batting all my stuff off the counters.” She tells Toriel dryly, sitting back down. 

“I can’t help it, it’s instinct!” Shadow moans, then rolls his eyes as Frisk (who’s taken an immediate shine to the new monster) snickers.

Everyone begins to laugh, but the laughter stops as Frisk pauses, gets a quizzical look on their face, and then slowly begins to turn translucent, fading from view - you’re wondering if you’re seeing things, one moment, and then the next all that’s left of Frisk is their smile, hovering in the air-

“FRISK!” Toriel bellows, panicked, and Frisk, blinking, snaps back into reality. “Goodness! What on earth was that, child!? Are you alright?!” Toriel demands. Natalie and Shadow obviously exchange another worried glance, before Shadow says, 

“Um…. majesty…. I think that one might have been my fault? Some...how?” He shrinks slightly, ears flat on his head as everyone turns to look at him. “Just, that’s what I do. My magic. I go invisible-”

“Oh!” Toriel says, then sighs. “Well. That is what we’re here for, isn’t it? To help Frisk get a better control of the magic they use?”

Everyone, after a moment’s hesitation, agrees, and lunch preparation slowly begins anew. Shadow, though, stays frozen for a second, and then sidles up to you and Sans, speaking low.

“So. Uh. Magic. Humans. Nat said human mages needed a power source to do magic.” He says softly, and Sans nods slowly. “So… the kid…” Shadow begins, looking worried. You understand his concern almost immediately. 

“Oh, god. Trust me, Frisk wouldn’t hurt a fly. And Toriel would never let anyone hurt them, either.”

“...Okay. So, then, how did they go invisible?” Shadow says softly. Sans clears his throat, the lights in his eyes dim.

“wish i knew, bud.” He answers grimly.


	139. Wherein Everyone's Stoked For A Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [You make me wanna shoop.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Shadow looks a little leery of Frisk after that display - well, sure, it had to be bizarre to see someone else using your own magic, you figure - but things soon quiet down enough for everyone to begin munching at grilled cheeses and tomato soup (and, at your insistence that everyone have at least something green, a really half-assed salad). 

Frisk isn’t making eyecontact with anyone, which is pretty unusual for your cousin. They normally like to be up in your business, yammering away at you or following Ghost around or begging Papyrus for piggyback rides. The fact that they’re just glumly staring down into their soup, halfheartedly dunking a sandwich half, alerts you that something’s up.

Sans notices too, and speaks up before you can. “whatsamatter, kid?”

 **I’m sorry.** Frisk says quietly, remembering to sign along, if only so Natalie can tell that they’re speaking. 

“Why are you sorry?” You ask, your brow furrowed. 

**I didn’t mean to do magic wrong. I’m sorry, Mr. Shadow.** Frisk says, their eyes flicking up from the soup for a split second. Shadow freezes, then slowly shakes his head. 

“Hey.” His voice is more gentle than you’ve ever heard it, a soothing purr behind his words. “It’s okay. You just caught me by surprise, bud.” He glances up at Toriel to make sure he’s doing okay, then looks reassured by the warm smile on her face. “I think I was about your age the first time I disappeared all the way. Nobody else in my family does that. My mom practically had kittens.” He says, a distant smile on his face at the memory. 

**But I didn’t even mean to do it!** Frisk protests, sticking their bottom lip out. 

“sure. but hey, that’s why you’re hanging out with us, right? between all of us, we’ll make sure you know how to use your magic on purpose, right bud?” Sans says, moving his grilled cheese quarter distractedly through the huge reservoir of ketchup he’s poured for himself instead of soup. Your stomach growls just as you’re thinking that this is disgusting, and you have to distract yourself from that, looking back over at Frisk. 

“Yeah. Hey, I get it. My magic is always doing weird stuff too.” You confide in them. 

“always.” Sans agrees, a bit too readily, and you roll your eyes at him. Still, the pep talk seems to take; Frisk gives you all a shy smile, and then gets back to work eating their lunch. 

\---------------------------------------

As it turns out, your help in training Frisk is not, well, strictly needed. You’d always needed to concentrate and force yourself to use your magic - the only thing that had ever come easily was the shortcuts, and you thought your aptitude for those had more to do with the fact that they were just second nature to Sans than any skill on your own part. 

Frisk doesn’t have this problem. No, they’re a natural. At almost _everything_. You all move out into the backyard (Natalie hangs quizzically by your shoulder, watching), and Undyne bellows at Frisk to make a spear.

Frisk shrugs and makes a spear - one identical to Undyne’s in every aspect but scale. It’s just… _nothing_ to them. Undyne lets out a slow, delighted gasp, and you try not to feel inferior that your own spear is so… unorthodox? Bony? Before you know it, they’re demonstrating to each of the monsters, in turn, some small aspect of their magic - except for Toriel, who wanders over to the patio, where you and Nat have crept back to. 

“I feel that I should not actually encourage them to play with fire.” She sighs, and then looks you over. “Oh! Look at you!”

“...Yeah.” Toriel has noticed, suddenly, that you’re showing. You duck your head as Nat chuckles quietly. It’s just that… well, this is honestly the closest you have to an elder relative, this goat monster, and you’re not even sure what she’ll think about…

“Oh goodness. I have never seen a pregnant human before - should you be sitting? I suspect you should be sitting. Let me fetch you a chair!”

“Tori, I’m fine!” You laugh, then, when Nat clears her throat, you admit, “Well, I mean, I’m always hungry and ho… honestly my hips hurt sometimes,” (that had not been what you had been planning on saying) “and already none of my clothes fit, but….” It’s too late. She’s already hurrying back with a deck chair. 

“When I was expecting, I constantly wished for watercress.” She says fondly, reminiscing. “I used to send Asgore all over Waterfall, hunting for it.” She smiles knowingly at you. “Do humans get those strange cravings?” You grin and shrug, sitting down. 

“Um, can you guys please get chairs too so I’m not the only person sitting?”

“On it!” Nat, desperate to appear useful, dashes back over to the lawn furniture. Toriel smiles after her. 

“I like your human friend! She is very muddy!”

Er. Right. Nat and Shadow still looked like they had been through the depths of a cave. At least Shadow had been absently grooming the dirt off of his paws all afternoon. 

“Yeah, she likes the outdoors!” You lie vaguely, then smile as she returns with chairs. “As far as cravings… I mean, I want all food. Always. I could… oh, I could go for some spanikopita right now. Or some biscuits. Or, oh man, I miss sushi.” You whine. Toriel’s eyes are already sparkling, and you remember, too late, that Toriel loves nothing more than to feed people homemade food. “But, you know, Sans takes really good care of me.” You supply quickly, and then scowl at Natalie as she winks bawdily at you over Toriel’s shoulder. 

“Oh I am certain he- oops! Do you mind if I take this call?” Toriel interrupts herself as her phone starts ringing.

“Not at all.” You say firmly, relieved, and give Nat another glare for good measure. You absolutely refuse to get into another cringeworthy conversation where Toriel makes sex jokes. 

“Oh, hello Asgore!” Toriel just sounds friendly, but there’s a touch of color to her cheeks. You wonder how that whole relationship is going, then decide, folding your arms around your belly reflexively, that you don’t want to know. 

“Oh! Hello Tori!” You can hear Asgore’s booming voice from the speaker on her phone. He sounds flustered, even though he’s the one who called. “I was just, er, wondering… if you and Frisk were still, er, planning on coming over to barbeque this afternoon?”

Toriel’s face falls. “Oh. Dear. I am afraid that I may have… forgotten?” She says in an unnaturally high voice, her face bright red under her snowy fur now. “I brought Frisk over to see their cousin and Sans and Papyrus and Undyne…”

“Oh. Gosh.” Asgore sounds even more awkward now. 

“Er. Perhaps we could invite our friends to join us at the palace for a barbeque?” Toriel asks quickly, and you grimace, thinking of the last time you’d been at the palace, the tension between Asgore and Sans, the possibility of Gaster wandering around… eesh. You glance up to note, with relief, that Sans has drifted closer and is listening attentively. He shakes his head no, once, and you sag in your chair, happy that nothing of the sort will happen. 

“Um.” Asgore, too, sounds very reluctant. “It is just that… I only prepared enough food for the three of us. So really-”

“OH!” Papyrus’ sudden, eager voice, startles you - he’s crept up to be suddenly standing at Natalie’s other side. “WELL! THEN KING ASGORE SHOULD JUST COME HERE! WE HAVE MORE THAN ENOUGH FOOD TO GRILL! PETER SAID HE WANTED TO THROW ME A BIRTHDAY PARTY AND I SAID THAT I DIDN’T HAVE A BIRTHDAY AND HE SAID THAT EVERYONE HAD A BIRTHDAY AND HE WAS JUST GOING TO MAKE ONE FOR ME BUT THEN HE LEFT AND NOW WE HAVE ALL THESE EXTRA HOT DOGS!” He beams, clearly delighted with himself for finding a solution to the problem. You, on the other hand, wince, first wondering if Papyrus is disappointed that he’s not going to have his party, then grimace harder as the thought of the awkward barbecue occurs to you.

“Oh!” Toriel sounds quite pleased. “Did you hear Papyrus, dear? Would you just like to come here?”

“...I can not think of a reason why I would not.” Asgore says, sounding a little glum. “I will… see you soon?”

“Perfect! We will see you soon!” Toriel says, and hangs up the phone, turning in her chair to beam at Papyrus. 

Behind her back, Sans throws his hands in the air in silent, mimed, frustration. 

You’d laugh if you weren’t already cringing.

\------------------------------------------------

Training Frisk goes by the wayside at this point. Suddenly, you’re all scrambling to put together a party - Frisk and Undyne mutually decide that this is, in fact, Papyrus’ birthday party and begin making last minute arrangements, as Toriel bustles inside to bake a cake. Sans strolls over, taking her chair at your side and looking thoroughly disgruntled. 

“don’t want that asshole at my house.”

“I know. But like… it’ll be fine. Just be polite. Okay? You can do that. He’ll be polite too.” You say softly.

“Bad blood?” Nat guesses. “Or, um…” She looks Sans over. “Marrow?” 

“the guy threatened our kid-”

“Kind of-”

“and then let the guy who tried to kill us have free reign of the palace!”

“...Okay, that one he definitely did do.” You sigh. “He’s also letting us use the side of Mt. Ebott for our wedding, and employing your brother and dating my cousin’s mom, so… it’s in our best interest to be friendly, right?” 

Sans just grumbles, scooting his chair closer. You sigh, reaching over to tangle your fingers with his, and then look up as Undyne bellows, 

“YO ARE WE INVITING CODY? OR WOULD IT BE AWKWARD WITH THE WHOLE HE’S CRUSHING ON NAT THING?”

“What?” Shadow is suddenly very interested. “Who’s Cody?”

“That guy who’s sister I helped save?” Nat replies, sliding her sunglasses on and looking unperturbed. “He’s nice! He should come!”

“He’s crushing on you!” Shadow protests.

“Get used to it, dear.” Nat says cockily, and then, at Shadow’s dejected expression, throws her hands up. “Fine! Fine. But he’s nice and I bet the two of you would get along.” 

“Some other time.” Shadow says dryly, and wanders, supremely casually, over to pull up another chair alongside Nat. 

“Should we be making appetizers or something?” You yawn.

“asshole can bring his own damn appetizers.” Sans says flatly, then, when you give him a look, sighs. “i’ll be good. i’ll be good”

“Well, _I_ like Asgore.” Shadow can’t help himself. You recognize the deliberately contrary expression on his face and nearly groan - you knew cats well enough to know that this was probably more than a little instinctual. “He’s done an amazing job of keeping us all safe-”

“yeah? ask alph how safe she felt when she got kidnapped.”

“Well, look, he can’t stop the humans from doing everything bad, but-”

“he threatened our kid.” Sans says flatly. Shadow, who’d clearly been enjoying himself up until this point, falls flat, his argumentative expression dropping. 

“...He wouldn’t hurt a kid, though.” He says weakly, and Sans raises a browbone slowly. “Not… a monster, anyway.”

“super high praise.” Sans drawls, and it’s your turn to arch an eyebrow.

“Plus, this kid isn’t exactly a monster, is it?” You remark, resting a hand carefully on the slight swell that signifies the Dot. 

“...Okay. But. Asgore’s not like that. He’s watching out for the human and everything. He wouldn’t.” Shadow tries one more time, and Sans sighs. 

“you’re what, twenty, twenty-one?” He says, looking Shadow over. Shadow looks confused, but nods. “yeah. i’m not much older. but. you should talk to some of the real old-timers. try gerson. ask ‘em what it was like, fifty, a hundred, two hundred years ago. when kids who weren’t frisk fell down.” His eyesockets narrow. “ask him what kind of mercy asgore showed those kids.”

It had never been a secret, underground, what had happened to kids who weren’t Frisk. These days, it wasn’t a secret above ground, either. Shadow ducks his head, and you squirm. This would be different. Asgore would be on your side, after all. And… fuck, maybe the kid would just take after Sans and Asgore would be too charmed by the little monster to start thinking of them as a threat, right?

“Hi Frisk! Hi Queen Toriel!” Nat interjects suddenly, very loud, as the sliding glass door to the kitchen opens. For a second, you think that Toriel might have been eavesdropping, seeing the worried look on her face, but then she hisses, 

“Do we have any presents for Papyrus?”

The grim look falls off Sans’ face, and he mutters quickly at Nat and Shadow;

“uh, we’ll be back.” He hops off his chair, offers you his hand and traces a window in the air, and the next thing you know, you’re both standing in a deserted back aisle of a toy store.

“Oh… jeez.” You mutter distractedly. “Babe, do we have a budget?”

“hell no. this is all cap’s idea, anyway. we’ll put it on the corporate card.” Sans says smirking. You sigh, looking him over. 

“We should invite him.” You point out. 

“he’ll say no. same as every other thing i’ve invited him to. you’d think the guy lost a limb or something, way he’s been acting. it’s just a breakup.” Sans says. You raise your eyebrows.

“He lost his soul. Mostly.” You remind him.

“yeah, but… i mean, he can’t have, not if you don’t have it. magic doesn’t work that way. it’s gotta be in his head. like in that austin powers movie you keep imitating at me. he had his mojo the whole time.” Your eyebrows are really straining their limits of how high you can raise them now. “fine, fine. i’ll invite him. i’ll call, let’s get started on presents.”

\-----------------------------

You return home, a half hour later, with more plastic toys than you know what to do with. You dump them all on your bed - you’ll bring them down to surprise Papyrus later. He’s going to have fun with this. The pile of gifts looks amazing; Sans had paid extra to have them giftwrapped, or rather, Capra had. Which reminds you - 

“Sans. Call him.”

“he’s gonna be such a downer though!”

“HE’S YOUR BEST FRIEND!” You say, exasperated, and Sans chuckles, fishing out his phone. 

“besides you.” He reminds you with a wink, and dials. “...hey, pete.”

“Sans! Hey!” Sans has switched on speakerphone. Neither of you really expect Capra’s immediate and cheerful answer, though.

“uh… hey pal. everything good?”

“Yeah. Yup. Primo. What’s up?” Capra sounds… happy. Given the way he’s been moping for the past fortnight, this is thoroughly alarming. 

“...ok.” Sans says skeptically. “s’just that, uh, we decided to throw paps’ fake birthday today, and we were wondering, since it was your idea-”

“Oh! Shit! Yeah, of course, just let me get changed and I’ll head over. You guys need anything?”

“...We’re good, Cap.” You say softly, sharing a puzzled glance with Sans. “You’re sure you-”

“Totally! I’m totally free. This’ll be good. I miss you guys. This is fine. Great.” He says brightly. “Okay, see you soon!” He hangs up. You turn to Sans. He’s already staring at you, and he voices your thought before you can manage to get it out yourself. 

“... _what_?”


	140. Wherein Alphys Has Bad News

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [hanging out the passenger side of my best blog's ride, tryin' to holler at you](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

All things considered, worrying about the fact that your friend is, for once, in a good mood, seems kind of small. Especially since there were bigger, Asgore-shaped fish to fry. Maybe this was a good thing. Maybe Capra had either moved on, or made up with Mettaton. 

You kind of hoped it was the latter. Making up would certainly make your life easier, but also, well… they had been good together. They had definitely been bringing out the best in each other. And maybe… well maybe the house felt a little empty still. And maybe you’d been thinking about the Dot…

“what’s up?” Sans asks, seeing that you’re processing. You sigh and smile at him. 

“I’m just being wistful.” You admit. 

“right. like you do.” He laughs, raising his browbones. “wistful about what?” You glance out the window, at all your friends already playing around in the back yard, then at the pile of presents, then back at him. 

“I want Dot to feel like they have a family, when they get here. I mean, obviously they’ll have us, but… I don’t want them to ever worry that, if… anything happens, that they’re on their own.” You admit, and then, to your absolute horror, feel tears prickling behind your eyes. “Oh god, what is this!?” You say indignantly.

“...is it. um.” Sans looks very very very skeptical, all of a sudden, but he’s also got that look on his face, the one that’s worried you’re going to smack him if he says something.

“Yes?” You ask, irritably wiping your eyes. Sans hesitates, takes a deep breath, and then mumbles glancing at the ground and barely audible;

“...hormones?” 

“Of course not!” You snap, then pause and blink. “Oh my god. Oh my god, no, it is. Oh, mother of god, this isn’t fair.”

“i’m really sorry-”

“No, like, I felt like I was going to cry at a dog food commercial today!”

“pfft.” 

“Sans. The dog was being such. A good. Boy.” You stress, wiping your eyes again. “Oh, god, this is ridiculous. I’m crying because Capra and Mettaton probably won’t be around all the time to see our baby. They don’t even _want_ to be around a baby all the time! Goddamn, I don’t even want them around over the time, that sounds so overwhelming!” You say, and begin to snicker through your tears. 

Sans eyes you very cautiously. 

“hoo boy.” He finally says, and you groan. 

“I know.” You glare down at the slight swell of your belly again, and mutter, “You’d better be worth this bullshit, kiddo.” At that, Sans moves closer, sliding his arms around you, resting one hand on the spot just above the little green heart.

“they will be.” He promises, then, suddenly, glances up at you. “did… did they just move? i think i felt something-”

“They’re like the size of an apple.” You say dryly. “What you just felt, love, was my stomach growling. Again.” Actually, that’s best case scenario - you’re starving, sure, but it doesn’t seem like the right time to tell Sans that he’d probably gotten excited over gas.

“oh.” He looks a little disappointed all the same. “you sure? it totally felt-” Oh, screw decorum.

“It was either that or like, a future fart, Sans.” You say, and he stares up at you, eyes widening, before he absolutely loses it, laughing like you’ve rarely seen him laugh before, practically hanging off of you. It doesn’t take you long to join in. 

“‘m gonna call the kid that.” He finally gasps.

“No!” You protest weakly. 

“my little future fart.” He tries to maintain a straight face, but he can’t.

“Absolutely not.” 

“my legendary future-fartmaster.” He insists, and you lose it again.

“Maybe in private.” You finally concede, wiping your eyes once more - these are tears of laughter, at least, not dog-food-hormone-tears. “C’mon, babe. Let’s bring these presents down and join the party.”

“k.” He says, but makes no effort to separate from, you, leaning up to kiss you slowly, that magic tongue pressing against yours as he grabs a handful of your butt, and-

“You’re mean!” You whine, suddenly jerking away. He’d figured out the other thing about your being swamped with hormones already, of course, that it took practically nothing to get you all hot and bothered and frustrated and he was looking so good, that mixture of amused and protective and silly and sweet and absolutely wicked, and he’s kissing you again…

“Staaahp.” You say halfheartedly, a minute or two later, like you had not been an active participant. Like your fingers are not, certainly not, not at all tracing his hipbones. 

“really?” He’s a little out of breath, you have to notice. Good. Good good good.

“Really really.” You force yourself to say. “Nat and Shadow hardly know anyone down there but us and we left them on their own and it’s Papyrus’ pretend birthday…”

Okay. Fine. You’d be a little more convincing if you weren’t kissing him again. 

It takes a booming laugh from the backyard to get both of you back to your senses; oh, right. Asgore was coming to your house. Well, now Asgore was _at_ your house. 

“lame.” Sans grumbles, his hand sliding away from the bra clasp he’d been trying very hard to pretend he wasn’t deliberately opening. About eighty percent of you wants to whine pitifully, but the other twenty percent suddenly perks up at the concept of cake. 

“C’mon. We’ll be back up here before you know it. And there’s gonna be food!”

“i need a minute.” Sans mutters unhappily, considerably less cheered than you at the prospect of food. You snicker unkindly, looking him over, and then manage to extract yourself from his grasp, pacing over to the mirror to get your hair back in order. 

It takes more than a minute, but eventually, just a little unhappily, the two of you make your way outside, grins plastered to your faces, arms full of presents, just the tiniest bit resentful that this birthday thing had to happen right in the middle of a very promising makeout. It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s-

“Oh! Sans! ________! Thank you for, er, extending the invitation to your home!” Asgore spots you behind the piles of presents. Sans, who had been carefully floating them, one by one, onto the table to prevent them from being damaged, abruptly drops the rest of his armload, turning at once to face Asgore. You want to roll your eyes just a little - Asgore’s not about to _attack_ you or the baby! - but you stay impassive, carefully arranging your own presents one by one.

“hey. yeah. frisk and tori were already here. made plans with us. so.” Sans is saying. He doesn’t strictly need to be so standoffish, you suppose. 

“Ah. Yes. They also made plans with me-”

“guess they had to decide who’s more important, family or-” Oh goddamn it, he’s gonna start this whole thing again. 

“No they didn’t, babe.” You laugh, and deposit your last present, giving Asgore your warmest smile. “We’re glad you could come. It’s silly, having two things for them to run back and forth to.” Asgore looks gratefully at you, ducking his massive head a little. 

“I am very sorry, I did not realize that today was Papyrus’-”

“he doesn’t have one. this is pretend.” Sans drawls lazily. “gaster found him in the void, same as me. the guy didn’t exactly care to assign birthdays. we weren’t _for_ that.” His smile is enormous now. You make a mental note to not frustrate the skeleton immediately before he interacts with anyone important, and give him the tiniest nudge with your hip.

“Well, you should both have one. You’ve got tons of people who love you now.” You remind him. His expression softens at the reminder, and he looks fondly over at you. 

“suppose he did find me around halloween.” He admits, and you beam.

“Hell yeah! We’ll assign my spooky fiance the spoooookiest of birthdays.” You tease, and then look back up at Asgore, who looks a little more relaxed by your good mood. “How’s everything at the palace, Asgore?”

“Oh!” He seems surprised that you’re willing to be so friendly. You’re willing to do just about anything if it keeps your baby safe, though, and this is not an enormous sacrifice. “Very well, thank you. I, er, recently met with your friend Peter. We approved the expansion of his facilities to use the entire output of the Core, in return for free power for all of the monster neighborhoods.” He pauses, then adds, “Is he…. he did not seem himself. Is he…”

“dunno.” Sans is surprised enough that Asgore had noticed Capra’s behavior to forget to be a dick. “he’s comin’ here in a few, though, so…”

“Ah.” An awkward pause hangs around the present-strewn picnic table, then Asgore perks up. “And the baby, is all well… oh!” As you step out from behind the pile of presents, he notices, for the first time, that you’re visibly pregnant.

Sans doesn’t say anything. He just sticks to your side like glue, radiating protective smugness. 

An awkward few seconds pass. You longingly stare over Asgore’s shoulder, where Undyne, Papyrus, LD, Frisk, Alphys, Shadow, Nat and Toriel are all playing frisbee. You don’t even like frisbee, it just seems so preferable to this conversation. 

“...You look pregnant!” Asgore finally says weakly. 

“...Yup.” You agree. 

Another awkward silence descends. 

“...My wife was once pregnant?” Asgore attempts, glancing over at Toriel. 

“...Yup.” You agree. Sans shifts a centimeter closer. 

“Their soul is very beautiful.” Asgore says at last, ducking his head again.

“thanks.” Sans says, a tiny bit more sincere than he’s been all evening. 

“...I would like to ap- Oh!” Asgore cuts himself off abruptly, looking over your shoulder now. “Look! Your friend Peter is here!”

“thank god.” Sans mutters, turning around. You sigh and turn as well, watching Capra jog up from around the side of the house. 

“Hey guys!” He says brightly, looking around. “Is this, uh, everyone?” 

You turn and look at the motley assemblage of party guests, then look back at Capra, nodding. “Um. Yep. Mettaton’s in the Adirondacks right now. He’s guest starring in Wes Anderson movie. Awkward boys camping, something like that.”

“Oh.” Capra’s expression falls, and you take him in at last. He looks… well, better? Better than he has in a while, for sure. He’s still a little dishevelled, his hair out of place, still a little gaunt and pale. After a second, though, he brightens; “But that means he’s maybe not screening my calls, he’s just-”

“yeah, bud.” Sans says sympathetically. “no reception. we tried too. he’ll be back next week though.”   
“A week?!” It sounds like this is a blow to Capra. “...You know what? That’s fine. This is fine. This is all okay. I can wait a week.”

“...What’s up, Cap?” You ask quietly, absently looking through him, down to his soul. It still looks… well, bad. Shrivelled and gray and faintly translucent. 

“I told you, I was gonna fix it.” His eyes are bright. “I fixed it. Everything’s gonna be okay.” 

“uh. what does ‘i fixed it’ mean?” Sans asks slowly. Capra opens his mouth, looking between the two of you, clearly eager to talk, then hesitates. 

“...Fuck. I should probably tell him first. I should really. Yeah. Yeah. I gotta do this right. But. I did it. I did it. It’s gonna be fine. I can fix this all. I _have_ fixed it all. He’ll come back and I’ll be here and…” He takes a deep breath. “It’ll be fine.” He finally repeats, the placid smile of an absolutely certain man crossing his face. “It’s just a week.” He repeats, after a second.

“O...kay, Cap.” You mutter, and he looks at you again, more focused. 

“I fucking love your mom and dad. I love them.” He says nonsensically, then blinks. “Holy shit, look at you! That thing is happening!” He takes a step back to stare at your stomach, then beams at Sans. “You gotta be happy.” He drawls.

“uh… i mean, yeah, but?” Sans sounds bewildered by the abrupt change in conversation. 

“Just, you know, your _thing_. I always wondered, is it all pregnant chicks, or just her-”

“capra!” Sans snaps, and you abruptly flush. “you said - golf - between us - man code-” He sputters indignantly.

“Did I?” Capra says innocently, though he looks very amused. “Sorry. I was drinking-”

“just. her.” Sans grinds out, then looks pitifully up at you, so remorseful that you have to laugh.

“Baby, I… did, you know, notice.” You chuckle. “And there’s kind of, you know, worse things than a guy having the hots for his pregnant wife-”

“fiancee.” He reminds you reflexively, and Capra’s eyes widen. 

“Sans, that reminds me.” He looks up at you. “Gotta steal him. I have some bachelor party questions.”

“No. Strippers.” You say at once, and Sans makes a face.

“why the hell would i want strippers?” He says, and Capra scrambles not to look disappointed. 

“Fine. Okay. But I have other ideas. Let’s go get Papyrus and talk.” He insists. Sans gives you a fleeting, mournful glance that makes you giggle again - he really doesn’t like leaving your side with Asgore around. You nod at him, leaning to kiss the top of his head. 

“Go on. I gotta start the grill, anyway.” Sans hesitates, sighs, and leans in for one slightly audacious kiss before he pulls away, leading Capra over to Papyrus. You watch them, then shrug mentally and head over to the grill, cutting a hole to the void so Spot can come out and play as you do so. 

She bounds out, all eager, puppyish energy, and begins to enthusiastically sniff around, leaning against you as you pour out the charcoal and struggle to light it. This, you have to admit, had ended up being a good day. Everyone seems more or less happy, the weather is just starting to get cool, Nat and Shadow seem to be getting along with everyone else, and Papyrus is clearly blissful at his first birthday party. He’s talking animatedly with Capra and Sans, waving his arms around and making gestures that you can’t begin to guess the meaning of. It looks like it’s going to be _some_ bachelor party. You wonder, vaguely, if yours will compare…

Looking around the yard, you see that Undyne is still enthusiastically playing Frisbee, but Alphys has peeled off, and is talking, near the side yard, with Asgore. Asgore is nodding slowly, a kind look on his face - once, he rests his massive paw on Alphys’ shoulder, nearly enveloping it. You observe this quietly for a moment, then start as Toriel speaks, behind you.

“I did talk to him, you know.” She says quietly.

“Hm?”

“My husband. He has promised. Neither you, nor any of your children - any children, ever - will come to harm. I reminded him that he owes an enormous debt to you, and to Sans, and that human magic is what saved us from a likely massacre.”

“...Well, thanks, Tori.” You turn around to look at her, and your stomach growls again, loud enough for both of you to hear it. She titters out a laugh, but you have to swallow, your mouth watering, as a terrible realization occurs to you. 

“Oh nooo.” You whisper, looking at her. Her arms are full of supplies for the barbeque - hot dogs and hamburgers, buns, mustard, mayo and… “Oh noooo…” You mutter again. 

“What is wrong, my child?!” Toriel sounds panicked. You stare at the ketchup in her arms, and your mouth waters again. 

“Oh, this isn’t fair.” You whisper, then look up at her, suddenly feeling pathetic. “I think I’m having a craving.” 

“Oh!” She titters. “Is that all!? I had those, with my son. Watercress-” She trails off as you deftly relieve her of the ketchup, hurrying over to an open bag of popapo chisps and squirting a little on one. You pop it in your mouth, and then groan. Oh, fuck, goddamn, that is the best thing you’ve ever tasted. “Well, it could certainly be worse!” Toriel chuckles. “It could be something rare or expensive or-”

“You don’t understand.” You sigh, glumly eating another chisp, gooping more ketchup on. “I’ve been begging Sans to eat vegetables for so long. I told him that ketchup wasn’t food. He’s gonna be so-”

“enjoying yourself?” The spectacularly smug skeleton is suddenly at your elbow. You glare at him. 

“This is all your fault!” You protest, reaching for another chisp. 

“it’s just the kid telling you what they want.” Sans says sweetly, then grins even wider. “kid takes after their old man-”

“I’m getting a bowl.” You grumble, glaring at him. He follows you into the kitchen, of course, and is stealing yet another kiss, nudging you up against the kitchen table in a way that triggers a flood of memories - oh, god, he’s being so bad today…

“you taste good.” He murmurs, and you make a face at him, not moving an inch. 

“You’re a jerk.” If he didn’t care last time, he certainly doesn’t care this time - he nips your neck and you whine helplessly, grabbing two handfuls of the back of his t-shirt and wishing that your emotions couldn’t be manipulated quite so easily.

“i’ll go buy you a huge thing of ketchup after they all leave.” He murmurs in your ear. “promise.” Oh, god, that should not do it for you. This is so embarrassing.

“...And salt and vinegar chisps?” You ask, humiliatingly breathy. He stops teasing your neck to look properly at you, and you could probably drown in all that love and affection in his gaze.

“sure. salt and vinegar chisps.” He murmurs, but you know he’s actually just saying ‘I love you,’ and that makes you melt even further. You let out a little squeak as he picks you up, shifting you so you’re sitting on the edge of the kitchen table, and he’s between your legs, leaning down to kiss you, his hands in your hair and-

“Hey!” Capra pushes open the sliding glass door, calling out cheerfully. He immediately stops in his tracks as the two of you look at him like deer in the headlights. “Um. I can. Should I… Oh, jesus. It’s the goddamn kitchen, for fuck’s sakes. I’m not apologizing. You two can literally go _anywhere_.” He reminds you, his awkward tone disappearing almost immediately. “Anyway, c’mon. Undyne and Alphys have a big announcement that they want you assholes there for.” He raises his eyebrows pointedly, waiting in the doorframe, until Sans very slowly inches away from you, and you guiltily hop back down from the table, not meeting anyone’s eyes.

You do take the ketchup, and a bowl, back outside with you. 

Alphys and Undyne have gathered everyone around on the patio, and are standing just slightly off it, on the grass, their hands woven together. You can tell from the enormous smile on Undyne’s face what the announcement is, but… well, you forget your embarrassment and just beam at them, waiting for them to say it. 

“S-so… Undyne and I have b-been talking… and we d-decided-”

“WE’RE TOTALLY HAVING A KID!” Undyne can’t hold it in any longer.

“S-soon.” Alphys interjects, beaming up at Undyne, and then looks at you and Sans. “S-so our kids can grow up t-together, if that’s o-o-okay?”

“Of course it is!” You laugh, and Sans simultaneously nods, beaming, as everyone begins to cheer and clap and congratulate them. Undyne looks too thrilled to even believe that this is real - as you watch her, she pinches herself on a spot that looks like it’s probably been pinched, several times already. You peel off of Sans to make your way to her side as Toriel peppers Alphys with questions.

“Congrats.” You whisper, and hug her close. “I’m so happy for you both.” 

“ME TOO!” She booms, grinning down at you. “I can’t believe she changed her mind. I guess the world isn’t so scary, after all.” 

“Hell no!” Capra agrees, laughing. “World’s not scary at all. It’s perfect. Congrats, guys.” He looks between them, then at you and Sans, then glances back at the mansion. 

“Everything’s gonna be perfect.” He says quietly.


	141. Wherein TST Doesn't Do The Classic Smut-Chapter-Gotta-End-It-Upsettingly-Switcharoo Or Whatever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter has sexy stuff in it, fair warning.
> 
> [Any damsel that's in distress/Be out of that dress when she meet TST](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [STREAM.](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington) Okay but also after 9 PM EST today's stream is NSFW, so you gotta be of age to click that link my dudes. Also, you know, you should be to read chapters like this just sayin' just sayin'.

The party winds on into the evening, a warm, satisfied feeling creeping into your soul as everyone just… gets along. Asgore seems to have unwound at least a little, playing with Frisk - some game from his youth that involves charging at each other as if they were about to butt heads, then screeching to a stop at the very last second. Toriel winces every time they line up, but eventually she has to relax too - Frisk is much more nimble than Asgore, and is laughing so uproariously the entire time they’re playing that she can’t manage to scold either of them into being safer. 

Alphys and Undyne are both in better moods than you’ve seen them in months. Undyne takes over the grill, wearing one of Papyrus’ best aprons (reading “Boy/Grill Party!”) and flipping burgers with, possibly, too much enthusiasm. Alphys just happily watches her for a while, but then gets busy decorating Papyrus’ birthday cake with elaborate patterns of chocolate candies. Capra watches this for a second, then shrugs and joins in - after a while, you notice them snickering and realize that they’re writing something in binary with the M&Ms… probably something questionable. Still, it’s nice to see them both having fun, since things hadn’t been so easy for either of them recently. 

Nat, Shadow and Papyrus eventually tire of frisbee and head over to the patio, where you and Sans are still standing. Sans sees them coming, of course, and he has to mutter;

“last chance to go back inside…” 

The buttface. He knows how tempting that is for you right now - god, you could definitely use a few more minutes alone with him. More than a few minutes. Several hours? He _smells_ good. What the hell is that? Well, you were beginning to smell everything stronger these days. That was definitely another one of those pregnancy things. But did he have to smell so damn good?

“Behave.” You scold quietly, and he snickers unpleasantly, tangling his fingers with yours and stroking the inside of your wrist with his thumb just frequently enough to ensure you don’t forget that he’s there as you begin to joke and laugh with Nat, Shadow and Papyrus.

This persists through the rest of the night; your fiance is definitely clingy, and you definitely don’t mind. It nearly makes up for all the interruptions today, and definitely reminds you that you shouldn’t be grouchy just because you couldn’t be with Sans right this very instant. So, you’re just… distracted. Capra, who almost certainly knows why, keeps shooting you looks that are first kind of amused, then exasperated, and then… honestly, probably a little jealous. 

He sticks around only long enough to watch Papyrus open his pile of presents - fair, since he had technically bought all of them. Papyrus is absolutely gleeful, of course; he’d gotten more action figures than he could possibly know what to do with, and three different board games, and a starter kit for some anime card game that Alphys and Frisk both played (and temporary tattoos, and candy, and an ant farm, and a remote controlled dinosaur, and… well, enough that anyone else would be thoroughly spoiled.) Capra watches, occasionally glancing at his phone - okay, he’s been doing that all night, actually - and then announces his exit right after everyone sings happy birthday, demurring when Toriel offers him a slice of the cake. 

“Got work in the morning.” He says, then looks at Sans, Nat and Shadow (all of whom, at this point, have adult beverages in their hands - Sans’ first, but Nat and Shadow’s… several-th). For a second, you think he might give them a lecture on potential tardiness for work tomorrow, but he ends up just shrugging and says, “Have fun, guys. Happy Birthday, Paps.”

“YOU TOO!” Papyrus calls out cheerfully from his pile of gifts. 

Eventually, around Papyrus’ usual (early) bedtime, Toriel, Asgore and Frisk leave. The air feels a little lighter after that, even though it had been far from hostile today - still, Toriel and Asgore together often felt like chaperones in a way that Toriel on her own never did. You follow them to the front yard as they load into Asgore’s car, waving and watching the light in Papyrus’ room wink out - Sans had peeled off for a few minutes to read Papyrus a story, and you’re already missing his warmth next to you. You’re a little optimistic that maybe now your hosting duties might be over, but you’re not at all surprised to discover that Undyne and Alphys have invited Shadow and Nat to continue the party indoors. Oh well. Few more hours. And… yeah, you were totally going to have another slice of cake. 

When you make it back inside, after a little cleanup and with a judiciously candy-covered slice of cake balanced on a plate, everyone else is already in the family room; even Sans. You’re a little surprised by that - you’d been certain that he was going to sneak up on you for more kisses while everyone else is distracted, and you’re honestly a little miffed that he didn’t. Damn it, you want kisses!

“Hey, Nat and Shadow haven’t seen all the really bad Mettaton movies! We’re making them watch them!” Undyne calls out when she sees you.

“It does sound pretty funny.” Shadow snickers, then sighs, “...Plus we probably shouldn’t be driving home for a while. Somebody forgot that somebody was the DD.”

“BOTH OF THOSE SOMEBODIES ARE YOU!” Nat exclaims indignantly, laughing, and you roll your eyes.

“Just be safe. Crash here for the night. We’ve got tons of bedrooms.” 

Nat and Shadow glance at each other, weighing this one out, then Shadow grins. 

“Thanks. I’m getting another beer. Anyone else?!” There’s a roar of assent from everyone besides you and Sans - Sans is now giving you puppydog eyes, and when everyone else is distracted with their beverages, he sinks into the recliner, then pats his knee. Oh, can you just get away with sitting on his lap in public?  
You eye everyone else, and decide that you certainly can. Curling up on his lap and draping your legs over the arm of the chair, cake balanced on your lap, you beam at him as he hugs you closer for a second. 

“Hi.” You murmur. 

“hi. they’re staying over, huh?” He says quietly. “uh. late bedtime for us, then.” He is truly the king of subtlety. You raise your eyebrows, and say sweetly,

“Well, I’ll just have to keep you awake, won’t I?” 

“...oh.” Sans sounds a mixture of apprehensive and pleased by that answer, though he does start snickering when you promptly forget about him and turn back to your cake as Undyne hits the lights. 

You finish eating before the opening credits have even stopped spooling, and twist awkwardly to place your plate on the ground as the film begins - oh, god, you haven’t seen this one, but it’s… eesh, it looks like an all Mettaton production of Snow White.

“Oh my god.” You hear Shadow mutter quietly, and Nat takes in an audible breath - then the hysterical laughter begins. You snicker, then settle back more comfortably in Sans’ lap, pressing your face against his t-shirt and inhaling again - god, he smells good! 

He notices, of course, and you can see the lights in his eyes dancing with amused curiosity in the dark. “what’s up?” He murmurs, running a hand through your hair. You just smile at him, and then close your eyes and enjoy this for a second, being safe and warm and held and happy. This was perfect.

For a while, anyway. Once it becomes clear that everyone else is thoroughly engrossed in the trainwreck happening in front of you - except for Sans, who’s growing more and more lethargic in his hair petting, his eye sockets half closed - you decide that just being content is no longer enough. So, spectacularly casually, you let your hand drift over his chest and, tracing each rib, make your way, er, downwards.

He perks right up, of course, and you can see him, head suddenly rigid and still, pretending to watch the movie, but his eyes are focused on you, watching you from the corner of his vision. That’s not going to work. He’s got light-up eyeballs. Or, whatever those things are - he still wasn’t particularly clear on that subject. 

“Watch the movie.” You yawn lazily, your fingers slipping under the hem of his shirt. He stares at you for another long second, and then, laboriously, he turns his gaze back to the TV. Heh. His hold on you grows a little tighter, and then, as your fingers gently brush against his pelvis, his jaw tenses noticeably.

Good.

You almost immediately understand why he loves doing this to you so much, now. It’s been long enough since the two of you first got together that you know every single one of his favorite spots, even - no, especially - the weird ones that you could at least theoretically get away with touching in public. Okay. So. Tracing the ridge of his hip, fingers occasionally exploring somewhere just a little more audacious, slipping along the inside curves of his bones, the ones just for you… you probably couldn’t get away with any of that in public. 

But it’s dark, and you’re on his lap, blocking this exploration from view, and he’s… enjoying himself. He’s pretending not to, of course, he’s pretending not to even notice, but his jaw has finally relaxed, moreso than usual, and he’s taking deep, slow, deliberate breaths. His hand keeps moving along your side, and you know he’s trying to find somewhere - anywhere - something decidedly rude to touch in public, but… you’ve angled yourself nicely. Anything he does would be too obvious. This is kind of a shame, because hell, you want him to touch you, yes, right now… but it’s also pretty fun. He’s always so quick to take control, but for once, you’re entirely in the driver’s seat. So to speak. So… the movie continues and you just keep playing, watching his resolve fade until, abruptly, there’s that sudden extra pressure pressed against your leg as he makes the world’s quietest groan. You probably shouldn’t look as smug as you do; he abandons his pretense of watching the movie to give you a look that threatens, or promises, an interesting night, as soon as he can gracefully leave the situation.

You merely raise your eyebrows, then shift to carefully kiss his jawbone, fingers trailing, extremely briefly, over the bulge in his pants. He holds stock still, and when you inch back away, moving your hand back to only slightly safer territory, he’s got his eyes fixed to the heavens in clear, desperate concentration, trying staggeringly hard not to make a noise that will get you noticed. A sadistic part of you nearly wants to press this, but… well, you really don’t want to get caught, and…

Craning your neck, you glance over at the sofa and the loveseat at your friends. Undyne and Alphys are asleep, Shadow’s eyes are just cracked open, and Nat is sprawled out, head in his lap, faintly snoring. 

“soon as they’re all asleep, upstairs?” Sans sounds so hopeful, whispering in your ear, his voice just a little tense. You grin, starting to nod, then pause. 

“They’ll hear us.” You remind him. The family room was… well, not a safe place to assume a lack of eavesdroppers, since it was almost directly below your room. 

“so?” He hisses, and you snicker quietly, curling closer. “ok. fine. um. outside.”

“We just did that. And it’s chilly.” You pout playfully.

“lab.”

“Not very comfortable.” Okay, you’re just being mean, watching him strain to think of a place now. But, well, you ache enough as it is, growing a baby - you want a real bed! You punctuate this thought with another brush of your fingers, teasing him through his shorts, and he inhales sharply.

“...ok. got it.” He breathes, and glances quickly behind him again. You follow his gaze, and have just enough time to see that Shadow is fast asleep now too, before Sans abruptly stands up - still holding you in his arms - and steps through a shortcut to-

Huh.

You can’t immediately place yourself, mostly because it’s pitch black. Wherever you are is dark, and very warm, and it smells like cedar, maybe, and…

“Mmmm.” You’re distracted as he leans to kiss you, sinking to a seat on something with enough give to tell you, even though you’re back on his lap, that it’s a bed. Oh, this is much better. He’s not wasting any time, though - he’s got your top halfway off before you can even part from him to ask, “Where-” and then you’re cut off again, giggling, as you try to escape from your shirt, his teeth on your neck the second that you’re free enough to allow this. “Sssans?” You ask vaguely, inhaling again, trying to remember… 

It smells like him.

“never really thought i’d bring anyone back here.” He murmurs against your skin, making your heart abruptly start to thud. You love that, when he teases your neck like that. “hey, you’ve got time stuff, go back and tell teenage sans that someday he’s actually gonna get laid in this house-” He chuckles, trailing off only so that he can nip your earlobe.

“Oh! Ohhh…” You breathe - making a mental note to later ask more about Teenage Sans. You’ve been here, before, once. That had been by yourself, though - well, just you and Frisk and eventually a ton of other monster kids. You hadn’t wanted to be in this room, though, that day. It had been so empty, and Sans had been in danger, and you had been scared, and it had seemed so dark and sad…

But this is different. It’s warm. He’s warm, and it smells like him, and you’re in his _home_ , or somewhere that once was home, and it stirs something primal in you. 

“I love you.” You whisper, shifting so you’re straddling him properly. That’s starting to feel weird, with your belly (god, was there any less dignified term than ‘belly’?!) in the way; but, of course, the way that he looks at you, that undisguised _want_ you can make out as your eyes begin to adjust… well, you can’t even feel awkward when he’s looking at you like that, grinding against you just a little, his hands busy with your bra clasp.

“love you too.” He says, actually pausing at the important task (he still wasn’t _great_ at bras) to look up and meet your eyes.

“You’re okay down here?” You check quietly. “Even though it’s…”

“i’m good.” He says, after a second’s thought. “i know i’m not gonna be stuck here. i… i like bein’ here with you. i never thought… hahhh… that’s, uh, distracting…” He mutters, glancing down at your hand - you’d started teasing him again, still through his shorts.

“Keep talking.” You urge, and he gulps in a breath, remembering that he was trying to unfasten your bra. 

“uh…. uh. the… right. down here. mphh. i… fuck, this feels good. not, uh, that. i mean, yeah, that-” He presses harder against your hand, hoping for more, but you understand better than anyone the value in patience, now. Your touch grows even softer, and he nearly whimpers before he remembers himself, sliding your bra off. “just… bein’ happy. free. having you. i never let myself dream i’d have anything like this…. i never… fuck, i need you.”

“Wait.” You urge, and he sighs tightly, relaxing his hold as you slide off his lap. You carefully find the ground, intending only to shimmy out of your pants, but then find yourself giggling - he’s slipping out of his own pants, the end result being that the light in the room is suddenly much brighter. He grins at you, watching you emancipate yourself from one of the few (and, well, kinda ugly) pairs of panties that still fit you, his hand straying to his cock. “Wait.” You repeat, trying to look sternly at him, and he pouts so pathetically that you almost relent. You can’t think of the last time you’d seen him so bothered, which reminds you;

“So. That Capra thing.” You pronounce, and he groans.

“we had a rule! we don’t talk about capra during anything close to sex!”

“Okay, but-”

“it’s _your_ rule!” He hisses through the dark, and you can’t help it, you begin to giggle again. It takes you a few seconds to regain your composure. 

“Well, A) I shouldn’t have even had to make that rule, _Sans_ , and B)...” You trail off, and he looks up at you.  
“b?” He finally prompts. 

“Um. You really do… still like how I look?” You say, embarrassed by how quiet you’ve gotten, or how much you need to know the answer. 

He takes a moment where he stares disbelievingly between you and his glowing erection, as if you’ve just asked the stupidest question of all time. And, okay, he has a point. He’s more excited (and, uh, bigger - Sans had eventually confessed that he had some discretion that he occasionally chose to exert regarding exactly how he could manifest that whole business, which had answered a TON of questions) than you can recall seeing him in recent memory.

The humor fades from his gaze as he searches through the dark and finds the genuine worry in yours. He exhales slowly, then whispers, “yeah. ‘s that ok?” 

“Fuck yeah!” You laugh, startled, then shake your head. “Just… I guess… I don’t want to become just a ‘mom’. Not to you. I feel like it’s already happening, a little, with other people. We talk about the baby first, then eventually get around to me. I’m still me, though. Even if I can’t do, um, some of the fun stuff anymore. I can’t drink or go on rollercoasters or eat sushi or clean the litterbox - well, that’s not fun - but… this doesn’t have to change things, right? Between us?”

“of course not.” He assures you at once, then blinks, glancing down. “should i, uh… put this away?”

“No! No, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do serious talk right now, it’s just that I am kind of drowning in hormones right now and I really just kinda want to get properly fucked and I don’t know if you’ve got some sort of ‘worshipping at the divine temple of motherhood’ stuff going on, or - okay, you don’t have to laugh!” You protest, giggling weakly again and drumming your fingers anxiously on your thigh as he chuckles, low in his chest, and stands.

“i know it’s still you.” He says, that faint amusement in his voice still. “i don’t have a, uh, pregnancy thing. i’ve got a _you_ thing.” He slides his pants off his hips, and closes the distance, pressing close to you. “i think that what you’re doing for both of us right now is… amazing.” He murmurs, and pauses to kiss your neck. “doesn’t mean you’re not gonna get properly fucked, though.” He whispers, and you sigh, satisfied with this answer, and lean in to kiss him greedily once more, making an almost startled sound as his hand eagerly finds its way between your legs, then grinning against (invisible, magical) lips as he unsubtly navigates you back toward the bed.

He takes you at your word - without saying anything, you soon find yourself on your hands and knees as he positions himself behind you, panting slightly already. He presses against you testingly, preparing to push in, and you speak up again;

“Wait.”

You’re expecting a groan of frustration - maybe a little of you is actually hoping for it - but of course, what he says, even as you can practically feel him ache with need, is,

“you ok? should i-” 

You shake your head, glad that he can’t see the smile on your face from this position, then purr, “I’m fine. I just wanted to make sure you really, really wanted this-”

“i really, really wanted this six hours ago!” He sounds half crazed, now that he knows you’re just teasing him. “i’m gonna… fuck, i’m going nuts, show some mercy-”

“No mercy!" You tease him, then relax."Kidding. Kidding. Okay. Go ahe-aaaa?” You cut yourself off, almost shivering with sheer relief as he presses into you. He makes a low sound, a profoundly satisfied _growl_ , and for a moment, you have room in your head to feel terribly smug, that you could make him so hard, so needy, make him sound like _that_... and then he begins to move his hips, quickly and with a singular purpose, and you run entirely out of available memory, all the unnecessary processes in your brain grinding to a halt.

You get properly fucked.

\-------------------------------------------

Several hours later, you’re lying in his arms, just having woke up, a vague feeling in your chest that something’s wrong. He’s fast asleep, snoring quietly and tangled up with you even closer than normal - the bed is tiny, and you’d both thought that you should go home, but it had been so warm, and your body had been so tired…

Something is wrong, though.

Do you have to pee? Damn it, he doesn’t have a damn toilet in this house, you’ll have to wake him up and go home and… no. Nope. It’s not that.

You feel eyes on you.

Sitting up (scrambling up), your heart suddenly pounding, you search the darkness, your breath catching, trying to find something, someone, and damn it, it’s dark, it’s dark and…

And your fucking magic is gone again.

“Sans.” He’s already stirring, startled from your sudden movement. 

“whas wrong?” He slurs. “you-”

“My magic’s gone again. And... “ You blink, but before you can say the rest of your fear, he’s moved, turning on a lamp you hadn’t even noticed at the head of the bed and casting the room into light so you can see…

Nothing.

Nobody.

He’s looking at you, a busy, concerned expression on his face.

“I swear, I thought I saw… felt? I thought someone was…” You begin, and he grimaces, quickly checking the baby, his eyes sweeping over you.

“i don’t like this.” He mutters. “lessgo home.” 

He has to cut the shortcut of course. His eyes flash with worry as he does so, and he still looks concerned as you step through the doorway into your bedroom.

“you sure it’s-”

“It’s gone.” You mutter, then give him a weak, half-assed smile as he seals the doorway. “Uh, I guess this means that you gotta… um… saddle up again?” He just stares at you. “I’m sorry, babe, I’m just trying not to get too freaked out over this.” You whisper, and he sighs.

“i don’t like it.” He repeats, then looks at you. “well. look. maybe the traditional method just isn’t… cutting it, anymore?”

“It usually works, though!” You protest, and then bite your lip. “Mostly. But… what’s the alternative? Because, sorry babe, I’m not drinking your blood.” He exhales slowly, sitting on the edge of the bed. He’s been thinking about this, you can tell. 

“your cousin’s the same type of mage you are.” He says slowly. “and they just seem to be absorbing magic without tryin’. more than you do or capra. enough to actually use.” His browbone furrows, and he looks at you for a long moment before he picks up your hand - skarm, whatever - and places it carefully on his sternum. “try.” He urges. “just take some of mine.”

“I don’t like it.” You mutter at once. “What if it hurts?!” 

“you took gaster’s magic. all of it. you took capra’s. they’re still kickin’.” He points out, and you sigh. He’s right. It’s just…

“You gotta tell me. If it hurts. I’m watching your soul, I swear to god, anything starts happening to it and I’m pulling the plug-” You threaten vaguely, and he snorts.

“deal.” He braces himself, trying to look like he isn’t. You know him too well for that, though. “go.” He urges. You still hesitate for a moment, and then you concentrate. You know what it’s like, now, how to draw power in. Could you do that… slowly? Not stripping the soul, just… borrowing?

You’re naked. This is ridiculous. 

He’s waiting.

“PleasetellmeifithurtspleasetellmeI’llstoprightawayI’msorryI’msorry…” You mumble distractedly, pulling in.

There’s a rush, a surge of energy, a wave coursing through you and - that’s enough! You yank your hand away, breathing hard. “Shit! Shit. Are you-”

“fine.” He looks at you, nonplussed. “didn’t feel a thing.”

“...You’re sure?” You close your eyes, concentrating, but no, you’ve definitely succeeded, his magic is all through you again, filling all the empty space inside of you up in that way that just feels right.

“yeah.” He blinks. “like givin’ blood, i guess? maybe you gotta take a lot more than that for me to notice?”

“This is _plenty_.” You shiver. “I feel like I just drank twenty cups of coffee. This is almost too much.”

“...huh.” He’s thinking again. You can see the wheels in his head turning. He hesitates, holding up a hand; he’s about to have a thought, but then… “i’m probably overthinking this. you gotta get your sleep. come back to bed.”

He’s not wrong. It’s just that…

Oh, you don’t like any of this.

“you’re safe now.” He mumbles into your hair, once you’ve both climbed back into your own bed. “i gotcha. you’re fine.”

You hope he’s right.


	142. Wherein Mettaton Comes Home and Capra and Mettaton Get Back Together The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [when you're feeling certain feelings that just don't feel right? just treat those pesky feelings like a reading light!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Sleep doesn’t come easy that night. You’re jittery with Sans’ magic filling you, and anxious because you don’t understand what’s happening to you, and worried about the baby, and the consequences for them if you’re suddenly without magic. You check, four or five times, making sure their little soul is still glowing as brightly - and it is, it is, it’s fine, but….

Historically, you’ve been a happier camper. 

Sans might have slept, or he might not have. He doesn’t exactly look like hell the next morning, when he rouses you to grab a quick shower together. Then again, you think, distractedly shampooing, he’s a skeleton. And a sleepy one, in general, at that. He doesn’t show his exhaustion the same way as you. He’s worried though, you know that. Normally, after a night like last night, this shower would be featuring a lot more horseplay and reminders that the aquarium doesn’t need you there right this second. It would be a fun shower. This is a tense shower. Tense showers, it turns out are significantly less fun.

“I’m okay.” You finally sigh. “The baby’s okay too.” He’s been darting gazes between your two souls for several minutes. “And you-”

“fine.” He assures you. “that magic thing wasn’t a big deal. look.” He makes a show of floating the conditioner over to you, though you narrow your eyes at him when you see that it takes a little work to do so. “hey. that’s not your fault. it’s just harder to move things that weren’t alive.” He says at once. 

“...What?” This is kind of new information. He blinks at you. 

“it’s like… remember how you finally learned how to make your spear? you had to focus on a soul to use your magic?”

“Sure.” You say, then raise an eyebrow at him. “but, so like… when you move the armoire-”

“pretty easy. trees used to be alive. and they have… not a soul, i guess, but an essence. you never noticed? oh. wait. right.” He explains, then looks at you sadly. “sorry, babe. i know it’s probably tough, having human eyes.” 

“Well, it’s all I’ve ever known, so it’s not… a huge loss, you know.” You say, almost laughing, then glance down. “God… I hope Dot has whatever they need to make their life easier.” 

“yeah.” Sans mutters, then glances up at you. “you gonna be okay at work today? you know i’m right there, whenever you need me, right?” 

“I’ll be fine.” You assure him quietly. “I just have a grant proposal and a potential donor tour today, anyway. I mean, I gotta wear a dress and talk real good, but…” You grit your teeth, then exhale. “Sans, let’s not go underground for a while if we can help it, okay? Last night was kind of the nail in the coffin for me. Ever since I had that dream, or… you know, whatever that was, that night in the palace, about Toriel’s kid… I keep feeling like I’m being watched whenever I’m down there and I just-”

“yeah.” He nods, and you feel a sudden wave of relief. Part of you had been convinced that he’d just tell you that you were being hysterical; or worse, hormonal. “i didn’t want to say anything but… yeah. that’s a good idea.” He looks you over again. “promise me.” He says slowly. “promise me, you find yourself in any scrapes, you’ll get me?”

“I promise.” You sigh.

“i don’t feel good. going to work. leavin’ you.” He mutters, and you sigh and shrug. 

“Hey. Someone’s gotta take care of Capra, right? You’re probably the best man for the job.”

\-----------------------------------------------

The terrible thing was, he mused later, that you were right. The morning had been a blur of activity; he’d had to find and wake Shadow and Natalie, then Nat and you and Papyrus had made breakfast - well, spent a half hour playing with the ridiculously elaborate coffee machine to make mochas and lattes and all sorts of nonsense, while he’d and Shadow had gone on a bagel run and dealt with a human who’d taken his money like it was going to give her a disease, just touching it.

And, through all this, he’d been distracted by one pathetic fact. He was, somehow, literally the best person to take care of Peter Capra, and that, in itself, made him miss Mettaton in a way that he’d never thought he’d miss that shiny asshole before.

It was only a few more days, though. Few days, and Mettaton would come back, and things would be… 

Well, ‘perfect.’ That’s what Cap kept saying. But… Oh, Sans had some doubts about that. He knew a few things, he figured. He’d been around a quarter of a century - at the very least - and he figured he knew people pretty well. He’d always been a damn good judge of character. And so he thought that odds were good that when a man like Cap made wide-eyed, earnest, unblinking declarations that he’d fixed it all, that everything was going to go perfect… well, those statements usually predated everything going immediately to shit. 

He wasn’t ready for things to go to shit. For once, he wanted things to just keep going like they were, to be predictable. Boring, even. He could play nice with Asgore, he could even tolerate his dad lurking around corners of the palace, he could live with the MIB, he could deal with the glares he got when he went anywhere too human, he’d be fine with _all_ of that, as long as it meant that his family was safe.

And for a while, he’d been okay. Maybe not okay. Maybe it was more… in denial. He couldn’t rightly figure out what was wrong with him, that had made him just a-ok with the first few times that your magic had disappeared. It wasn’t like him to just be okay with that. It wasn’t like him to not panic about your magic going missing, or to not tear his father to shreds at the word that Gaster had talked to Papyrus, for that matter. He’d been pretending. He had been pretending for so long that everything was fine, ignoring the obvious signs that things weren’t fine, but today…

He’d learned about tsunamis, on the surface, deadly waves that could destroy coastal areas in a flash. Before they came, before humans had any idea they were about to happen, animals would take off. Something would signal them that it was time to get the hell out of dodge. 

He wonders if that’s what he’s feeling now - that feeling of unrest under his ribs, the faint feeling, like an itch, like a toothache, that something’s not right, that he’s been missing things, ignoring everything for too long. It’s like the sound of an alarm, just vaguely cutting through a dream. He can almost hear it, almost understand it. Almost. 

What had he been ignoring?

He’d just wanted you to be happy. He’d just wanted you to be normal, to have this time in your life be somewhere, somehow, close to normal.

He thinks, somehow, he might have fucked everything up, trying to give that to you.

He grits his teeth, and goes to check on Cap, a mug of coffee in his hand, a spare bagel he’d scrounged up in the kitchen that he was going to force Capra to eat if it killed him - the guy was too skinny. He pushes open Capra’s office door without knocking-

“Can you goddamn learn to knock, Sans?” Cap doesn’t even turn to look at him. He’s staring out of the big floor to ceiling windows in his office, searching the treeline for something. “What if I was, I don’t know, naked or something? Or, like, jackin’ it!?”

“uh… sorry, bud.” Sans snorts, startled. “are you often naked in here? or. um. jackin’ it.” Capra finally turns to look at him, an amused spark in his eyes. 

“Almost always.” He says, but of course, Sans knows when Cap is joking by now, even when the man maintains a spectacularly straight face. “Bagel.” He says, looking at the plate Sans is holding. “Is that for me? I guess I didn’t eat. But. Like. Threep is gonna be back in five days. Is now really the time for me to get into carbs?”

“eat your fucking bagel.” Sans groans, depositing the bagel and coffee on the big, shiny, CEO-y desk. “you lost weight. you look like shit.”

“Love you too, bud.” Capra mutters, but he does turn around, and he at least grabs the coffee, taking a deep sip before, “Blugh. Is there _chocolate_ in this? Why would any self-respecting-”

“before you complain, please note that my fiancee made that for you special and she didn’t have to.” Sans says dryly. Capra eyes him, and they stare at each other for a while. 

“She finally figured out how to use that stupid Italian coffee machine, huh?” He snorts at last, and turns, wandering over to his fishtank to sprinkle a few flakes into the goldfish container. He actually has two tanks now, Sans notes. The one he’d given you as a present for being a sport when he’d touched your arm had been added to the room, the pufferfish placidly swimming back and forth. It’s weird, to think of how irritated Sans had been (ok, ok, jealous) about the whole arm thing back then. He’d taken Capra’s general flirty demeanor as genuine interest in you. But, hell, he’d seen what Cap was like when he really _was_ interested, and while he didn’t doubt for a second that the Peter Capra of last January would have leaped for the chance to give you the, uh, thorough fucking you’d asked for last night (heh. heh heh heh)… well, the man in front of him now…. 

“This is all wrong, though. Coffee should just have coffee in it. Unnecessary calories.” Capra’s complaining.

“again. you need to consume calories, i think. pretty sure all humans need them.” Sans mutters, then sighs. “cap. do you have food in your house?”

“Sure.” 

“don’t lie to me, i know you too well, asshole.”

“Tuna’s food.”

“if you’re referring to that same can of tuna i found when i dropped you off at your house like six months ago… oh my god. you… _asshole_. i can’t even think of another word! you’re an asshole!” Sans groans. Capra at least has the good grace to look ashamed.

“I ate at the thingy last night.” He insists. Sans takes a breath.

“cap. look. why don’t you c’mon back. just for now, if you want. just for the next week. just stay with us. we need to practice taking care of something that can’t feed itself, anyway.” He offers, smiling in his friendliest way. A pained look crosses Capra’s face. 

“Uh. Look, buddy. It’s… that’s a real nice offer.” He sounds like it’s a struggle, getting the words out. “It’s just… I can’t right now.”

“why not?” He presses, knowing that he probably shouldn’t. “you can’t keep yourself alive without our help, so let us help. just for another week. five days. you said it yourself, everything’s gonna be perfect once mettaton gets back, right? so…”

Capra’s managed to force a smile back on his face, while Sans talks to him, but as he presses on, the smile grows more and more strained.

“I’ll go fucking nuts.” He says slowly. “I’ll convince myself I’m wrong. I’ll… I can’t be back there. Not without him. I can’t imagine. Sleeping there. Making food. It’s just…. fuck. I’m sorry. You’re so nice, the both of you. And Alph and Undyne and Paps, it’s just… It’ll be different, okay? Next week. It’ll be different. I’ll have seen him, he’ll have gotten all of my texts, I’ll make it right.”

“cap.” Sans sighs. “you told me, same night you left, how much you hated being at home these days-”

“Answer is no.” Capra says flatly. He takes a second, clears his throat, and then adds, “Thank you. But. No.” 

Sans’ heart does a funny thing. It’s that damn empathy thing. It feels… bad, seeing his friend in pain. And yes, behind that smile, behind that confident certitude, there’s pain. 

“you’d tell me, right?” He asks quietly. “if you were doin’ something stupid?”

“Probably not.” Capra admits, and distracts himself, taking a gulp of coffee. “God, that’s just wrong.” He mutters, staring in the cup. 

“ok. then… look, you don’t gotta stay. just come over for dinner this week. i’ll pick you up at like, five thirty tonight. bring you home. we’ll make eggplant parm. you like eggplant parm.” Sans bargains, that feeling in his chest growing stronger. Something’s wrong here, something he can’t put his damn finger on enough to identify, enough to even call out. Capra hesitates, thinking, and Sans watches him closely. Something’s definitely-

“Fine.” Capra agrees, then, almost reluctantly, “Thanks.” 

Sans slumps slightly, feeling relieved. Of course, it’s gonna drive him fucking nuts, now, he’s gonna be up at night again, thinking about this, because his instinct is telling him not to leave Capra to his own devices, that something bad is happening, and, and… Oh, god, he just doesn’t know why. 

_______________________

He rolls up to Capra’s office at 5:30 sharp. He’s… 

Well, he’s honestly not surprised, when the office is empty. 

Asshole. 

He goes in the next morning ready to rip Capra a new one. He can’t just fuck with his friends like this, even if he is the most lovesick man in human history. 

Capra’s still not there.

The company goes on running, of course. Procedures are in place. And, in fact, it turns out, on Wednesday, when Capra still hasn’t shown up - when he’s not at EbbCo, or at his house, or even at the Cock and Bull, when the police FINALLY start investigating his car, unmoved, in the parking lot - that Capra had designated an awful lot for Sans to do, if he was ever incapacitated again.

He’s busy.

He tries not to worry. 

He worries. 

_______________________

You and Sans go to the airport, anxious but optimistic, on Friday, waiting for Mettaton to arrive from his flight. If there’s anywhere Capra would be, you figure, it’s here. And at the very least, maybe Mettaton will know something you don’t, will be able to provide another piece of the puzzle…

You begin to grow anxious when he doesn’t appear in the flood of humans (and one other monster, a distressed Tsunderplane that raises more questions with you than it answers) exiting the plane. You stand on your tiptoes, searching the crowd anxiously, trying to find any sign of your friend.

He arrives almost five minutes after everyone else, a polished, blank look on his face. He’s not at all surprised to see you waiting at the gate for him. He’s got his phone in his hand. 

“Mettaton, are you okay? What-” 

He cuts you off, handing over his smartphone.

All of the texts Capra sent him over the past two weeks must have come rushing back in at once, the moment he got both a charge and service. They’re open in his messaging app now, and he nods, silently gesturing at you to read them. 

Peter:  
Okay this is the worst.  
Did you block my number?  
Aw fuck I hope you didn’t block my number.   
Threep, are you still at _______’s house or what  
Look, you dick, don’t just block  
okay you probably didn’t block me but  
my calls won’t go through  
I fixed it  
seriously I figured it out  
I gotta know  
do you still love me?  
okay okay you’re in the adirondacks or whatever  
You’re better than Wes Anderson, Threep  
His movies are just like  
You know what  
It’s fine  
I hope you’re having fun  
I’m so fucking glad you didn’t block me  
I’ll see you at the airport  
I hope you didn’t block me  
fuck  
I hope you didn’t lie to me  
I love you  
You wouldn’t lie  
Fuck I hope that Bill Murray is being nice to you  
Is bill murray even in this one?  
bet you anything he is  
I was gonna say a blowjobbut I think given our circustances tht’s probably not like   
I am so sorry. I was drinking heavily last night. That was bad.   
Sans is making me go over to their house for dinner this week though so like…   
Sorry. I’m sorry. I’m texting and you’re going to get these all at once and it’ll be fucking absurd.  
Mettaton. Listen. I am so fucking sorry about this. I’ll be back. I love you. I’ll be back. It’s okay. I promise.   
I gotta go save the world.


	143. Wherein It's All Action and Adventure Stuff Wow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [I am not throwing away my blog!](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

You stare, dumbfounded, down at the cell phone. Then back up at Mettaton, then down at the cellphone, then at Sans, like he’ll have some answers, then-

“I don’t suppose he told you what he meant by that. The saving the world thing.” Mettaton says quietly. You look helplessly at him, then at Sans. 

“...fraid not.” Sans says, more compassionately than you’ve ever heard him, addressing Mettaton anyway. Mettaton swallows roughly - it sounds like metal grinding, like static - then looks between the both of you. 

“I don’t know what to do.” He confesses softly.

“...Come home, Mettaton.” You offer, and close the distance, hugging him loosely. “Please.” 

He’s stiff in your grasp, but, after a long, long moment of thought, he relents. Relaxes. He leans into your hold, just for a second, then he nods.

“Alright.” He mutters.  
\----------------------------------------

He still walks back into the mansion like a stranger, like he’s seeing everything for the first time. Undyne, Alphys and Papyrus are waiting anxiously in the foyer, hoping for news, but when they see the three of you, their expressions, as one, plummet.

“M-mettaton…” Alphys begins, hurrying over to take his hand and squeeze it. 

“HE’S GOING TO BE FINE! I JUST KNOW IT!” Papyrus attempts, but that’s a big, fake smile on his face, and it’s never good when even Papyrus is lying. “HE PROBABLY WASN’T AT THE AIRPORT BECAUSE HE WAS VERY BUSY!”

Mettaton hesitates, then gives Papyrus a small, tolerant smile. “Yes, darling. Of course. I’m sure it’s something like that.”

“Well?” Undyne can’t wait. She’s rocking on her heels, twitching with nerves and barely contained anxiety in spite of herself. “Did he at least text you? What did he say? Where’d the dumbass go?!” Mettaton stares at her, clearly deciding whether or not he’s irritated, then pronounces slowly. 

“He said that he had to go save the world.”

Papyrus nods, like, well, like this makes perfect sense. Simultaneously, Alphys and Undyne groan. Alphys even slaps a hand to her forehead, utterly disbelieving. 

“He d-didn’t.” She grumbles, and Mettaton lets out a quick laugh, something bitter and resigned and, well, in love, all at once. 

“Of course he did.” He responds, glancing down at his phone again. His phone, you have to note, is so… Mettaton, with its shiny pink case and black rhinestone accents. It was the sort of thing that Capra would probably have gone off on for being hideous design - if it were anyone’s but Mettaton’s, anyway. Mettaton got a pass on things like that.

“IF PETER SAID THAT HE WAS GOING TO SAVE THE WORLD, I’M SURE HE’S DOING IT!” Papyrus says confidently. “WE’RE LUCKY TO HAVE SUCH A HEROIC FRIEND!”

“...good point, bro.” Sans agrees, when the silence after this comment grows a little too long. “i bet you’re right. he’s a smart guy.” 

“Oh, he’s smart as a damn…” Undyne begins, then, seeing the distraught look on Mettaton’s face, sighs. “I’m really sorry. You’re gonna stay with us, right?”

“he’s gonna stay.” Sans says, before Mettaton can weigh whether or not he wants to, really. “that way, we can all work together to find cap. and, you know, if cap comes home, someone will be more likely to be here to greet him.”

“You make him sound like a lost puppy.” Mettaton begins, and then grimaces. “You’re right though. I should stay. Wherever he is… he’d…”

“He’d want to know you were being taken care of.” You complete Mettaton’s thought, then look him over. “And right now, I can see you’re exhausted and covered in dirt and gunk and you need some time to… you know. Recharge.” He quirks an eyebrow at that, then sighs, nodding. 

“I was dreaming of a bath.”

“can you, uh, take a bath?” Sans asks, his curiosity getting the better of him. Mettaton levels his most withering, driest stare, barely quirking an eyebrow, as Alphys snorts indignantly. 

“Of course he can! I t-tested out all sorts of different waterproofing!” She says, then leans a little closer to Mettaton. “T-though.. um. Just… make sure all your ports are closed-”

“I _know_.” Mettaton groans, and then the two of them exchange a small smile of recognition. “Goodness, for someone who refuses to have children, you certainly are a mother hen when it comes to me-”

“About that.” Undyne is suddenly all smiles. “As soon as Alphys finishes building the incubator-”

“incubator?” Sans wants to know.

“Uh, d-duh! We’re w-working ladies! We can’t just s-sit around on some egg all day!” Alphys retorts, as wry as you’ve ever seen her. 

“...How much has changed, since I’ve left?” Mettaton says, not really asking the question, just… wistful. “Well. Congratulations to the both of you. I can’t say I understand what it’s like to want a child, but... “ He looks between you and Sans, then Alphys and Undyne, then settles finally, with some relief, on Papyrus, who shrugs at him, still smiling. 

“ME NEITHER!” 

Mettaton looks a little relieved at the reminder that he isn’t entirely surrounded by happy relationships, while the status of his is… questionable. He smiles at Papyrus, then sighs. “I think I will take that bath. Thank you, everyone.” He runs his hand distractedly through his hair, then makes a face at the feeling of grit in it. You watch him, fighting the urge to hug him again. 

“...Welcome home, Mettaton.” You finally murmur.

\------------------------------------

He emerges from his room, the one that he’d formerly shared with Capra, several hours later when the house is practically shut down. You and Sans have already read Paps a bedtime story, Alphys and Undyne have said their goodnights, and Sans is snoring in the recliner, totally disinterested in Book of Life, even though you’d tried to lure him in with talk about skeletons being super important in this one. 

You almost don’t hear Mettaton - his feet click very softly on the hardwood, and you’re focused on the movie, curled up under a blanket. He’s frozen in the doorframe, taking in you and Sans, clearly reluctant to intrude. 

You’re not having any of that, of course. You hop to your feet, walking quietly over to him, and take his hand, escorting him - only a little by force - into the kitchen. 

“I didn’t want to intrude.” He says. 

“You aren’t. I put a bottle of chardonnay in the fridge for you.” You reply at once. His eyebrows raise, and then he sighs. 

“I don’t even drink it, you know. Design flaw. Or, er, feature? I can’t, unless it’s magic. I mean, I can, but it just goes right through me. He… said it was wasteful. Well, he thought it was funny, but he was probably right. It is wasteful.” 

“Well. Maybe it is. But you like the taste, right?” You say with a crooked smile, and he chuckles. 

“Yes. I do.” 

‘Then go ahead. And I’ll have my seltzer and we can both pretend.” He laughs at that, a true laugh - not the show business one you’ve heard so many times before - and he goes ahead, uncorking the bottle and pouring himself a glass as you crack open a seltzer that purports to be Watermelon Margarita flavored. It just kinda tastes like seltzer. “Let’s go on the deck.” You propose. “I don’t want to wake up Sans. And it looks nice outside.”

“Won’t you get cold?” He eyes your sweatpants and hoodie dubiously. “It’s properly autumn now.”

“Not you too.” You groan. “This baby’s keeping me like, ten thousand degrees. I’d understand it if I’d gone and fucked Grillby, but-” You trail off as Mettaton sprays his mouthful of wine spectacularly out of his nose, and quickly puts the glass down, doing everything to not wake Sans as he shakes with silent laughter. You quickly grab a rag and clean up the mess, snickering, but he still waits until both of you are outside to berate you. 

“You can’t do that to me!” 

“What, you can’t actually choke, can you?”

“Still!” He looks affronted for a moment. “It’s undignified!” 

“Yeah, well, not a very dignified household.” You snicker, allowing yourself to be tugged along, past the chairs outside - Adirondack chairs seem like they’d be a particularly cruel reminder that Mettaton had been absent when Capra, clearly, had needed him - and over to the rarely used porch swing.

“No, I suppose it isn’t.” He agrees, sitting delicately on the seat, curling his legs up under him. You sit less delicately, groaning, and then look at him, actually taking him in at last. 

“Mettaton… I’m glad you’re here.” You murmur. “And… I’m sorry.”

“I am too.” He says softly - you’re not quite sure which part of what you’ve said he’s addressing. “And… thank you. For trying, with him. Not everyone tries. They just assume he’ll… do his own thing. And he will, usually, but… he needs that. He needs to know people care. ” 

“I wish I’d pressed it.” You admit. “If he were here, maybe I would have… maybe he would have told me. Not that he really talks to me. He talks to Sans.”

“He loves you.” Mettaton says, reaching distractedly for a piece of your hair that’s in your eyes. You don’t even blink as he turns your head slightly, beginning to braid without really thinking about it. That’s just… Mettaton. “He can’t bring himself to say it, of course. He’s still figuring all that out. And… he carries a great deal of guilt. Not being there for you. He knows you needed an older brother, and he knows that he could have been that person, but he…” He hesitates, and then undoes the braid he’d been working on, before huffing and starting again. “He does his best. He never accounts for the fact that he didn’t have the fairest start, himself. And then… god, having magic like his…” He mutters, then groans. “This isn’t going right.” He says, shaking the handful of hair he has enough that you know what he’s talking about. 

“Then let me.” You say, turning to meet his eyes. He relinquishes your hair at once, but looks surprised when, instead of reaching for your own hair, you reach for his. He hesitates for a second, then, again, relaxes, leaning slightly against you as you sort through perfectly soft, silky strands of hair, trying to remember how to do this. You feel a little silly, but something your mom had once told you, forever ago, rings in your head; people showed you, how they wanted to be cared for, with their own actions. 

“He didn’t make me love him.” Mettaton says abruptly, when the silence grows too long. “I know what it sounds like. I know what he thought. But he didn’t. It didn’t happen like that.”

“...What happened, then?” You ask, after a moment of thought. “I mean… It’s not that I don’t love Cap. I do. But you…”

“I know. I’ve heard it before. I deserve someone nicer, or more flashy, or someone more… open. Something like that. But he… He’s not nice. And that’s okay. I’m not nice, either, I think. More importantly, though… he’s kind. He’s… _good_. That’s what I fell in love with. He could have been so selfish. Most people are, you know? And him, with all of his money and all of his power - all of his _power_! - he could have been… god, he could have been a monster. He could have done terrible things.” Mettaton says, giving a small, theatrical shiver.

“A gift like that… even money like that… I think to most people, life would become a game. People would stop being people. I think that most people assume that he thinks like that. I think that, in part, he likes people to think like that, that he’s selfish and singleminded, because a person like that can be feared and envied and admired, but nobody asks anything more from them. Nobody falls in love with a caricature of a man. Nobody worries about him, and that’s okay. Because at least that way, nobody loves him and nobody worries about him for a _reason_.” He pauses, and takes a sip of his wine, looking at you from the corners of his eyes. 

“When your parents died, I think he assumed that the last people who would ever really care about him were gone. Until you showed up again, I think he gave up on that entirely. And yet… when the barrier fell, he was there for the monsters. So many humans reacted with hate and fear and instinctive disgust, and he had his arms open. I know he didn’t need to hire so many. The company was already floundering. He could have lost his job if another few months had gone by with so many expenditures and no… oh, god, listen to me, I sound like him. But… I saw that. I saw that when other people lashed out with fear and hatred, that he was kind. People never did become playthings to him. He had room in his heart to see that we were all people. Even me.” He says. 

“Was that all it took?” You ask, giving into your curiosity. “Just, at first…”

“I hated him a little. At first.” Mettaton admits. “He was loud and stubborn and too convinced of his own charm and handsomeness, and I was… loud and stubborn and too convinced of my own et cetera.” He says with a little sort of laughter. “He was handsome though. At first, that was more than enough. But plenty of people are handsome, or beautiful, or both. It was… when your father-in-law went missing. Excuse me. Father-in-law-to-be, I suppose. I just remember thinking that… god, he had risked his life and almost died for it, for us. And then his attacker is free, and he was just defenseless, and he’d done such a good job of making sure that nobody cared, but I’d heard him, I’d seen what he was like when his walls were down, how afraid he still was, how much of a nightmare that night had been, and I realized how much I cared. And then… god, the man was just… behind that smiling mask, he was so kind, and so hurt, and he needed me. And I needed… I wanted to be worthy of that kindness. I wanted to be the kind of person that deserved all that care and protection he wanted to give.” 

“Mettaton.” You say quietly, and slowly, finally, voice a fear that had been plaguing you. “Did I do something terrible? Taking his magic… his soul looks so…”

“I don’t know.” Mettaton whispers, after a long pause. “I know it’s what he wanted. I can’t… blame you. I want to, but I can’t.” He says with a laugh, and then chuckles as you pull your hands away, his braid holding its form only for a moment before the silky strands begin to drift back into their usual places. “Thank you for trying.” He says, and again, you’re not quite sure what he’s referring to. 

“He said he fixed it. He was waiting for you to come home. I know he figured out something. He just wanted to tell you first.” You say quietly, scuffing a sneaker on the ground and rocking the porch swing. “Do you think he…”

“Do I think he’s really gone because he needs to save the world?” Mettaton guesses, and then gives you a tiny, close lipped smile when you nod. “I do. I really do.”

“Even without his… magic? Or soul, or whatever?”

Mettaton hesitates, then with a sigh, he slumps, resting his head on your shoulder and looking out over the back yard, over the water, his eyes resting on the peak of Mt. Ebott, on the other side of the bay. 

“I do.” He repeats, then gives a soft, ironic laugh. “I trust him.”


	144. Wherein You Crazy Kids Crack The Case

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey did you read the [sad AU chapters of Delete Or Be Deleted](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6122618/chapters/18931873) or like what?
> 
> [I'm taking this horse by the reins making red blogs redder with blogstains](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

The next day is tough. Mettaton sits everyone down in the kitchen in one of the war councils that are becoming alarmingly familiar.

“So.” He begins, moving a piece of bacon around on his plate with his fork. “Where have we already looked.”

“his house.” Sans begins.

“Eeesh. Yeah.” You agree, wrinkling your nose. Capra had certainly been living the, er, bachelor lifestyle, as evidenced by the pile of dirty suits that hadn’t made it to the laundromat or even onto hangers, or the equally impressive pile of empty Lagavulin bottles - you were going to stage a goddamn intervention as soon as you found that asshole, because that shit was not healthy and his liver was going to give and-

“His garage?” Mettaton prompts. 

“yep.” Sans sighs. “car’s not there though, it’s at ebbco.” 

“So he didn’t leave EbbCo.” Mettaton says, and you grimace. 

“Well. He didn’t leave EbbCo by car.” You say slowly. “Or, his car, anyway. There’s plenty of ways he could have left, though. He could have gotten a ride. Taxi, if he didn’t want to be found. And it kind of seems like he didn’t want to be found.” 

“But you checked EbbCo anyway, right?” Undyne demands. “Like, you checked-”

“his office. conference rooms. break rooms. bathrooms.”

“Underground?” Mettaton wants to know. 

“of course. all the labs.” Sans sighs. You clear your throat, looking at him. 

“There is a place we didn’t go.” You remind him. 

“we’re not - well, _you’re_ not goin’ down into that place.” Sans says at once. The table grows still and calm for a second, and then Mettaton, too nonchalantly, says,

“What place?” You groan, running your hand through your hair.

“There’s this cave chamber the excavators hit. Looks like some human mage stuff. Ends in a laboratory. I explored it with Nat, and then later me and Sans and Nat and Shadow all went. It’s only like three caves deep. But… it ends with a portal to the void, so-”

“What.” Mettaton’s tone could kill a man. “And you didn’t think to look for Peter there? There is literally… excuse me, I need a moment.” He closes his eyes, falling perfectly still, and takes a few seconds where he’s clearly trying to just not explode with anger. “There is literally one place that you’ve mentioned so far where Peter is LIKELY TO BE.” He finally snarls, then shakes his head. “I’m sorry, it’s just that.. could you possibly have described a place he’d be more interested in?!” 

“look, bud. it’s three caves. ‘sall. and he’s not in the void. i checked.” Sans says at once. “so.”

“You checked all of the void.” Mettaton says dryly, and Sans shakes his head.

“no need. i paid attention to where in the void that door in the lab opened to, and so i went there. and, well, no human would have made it too far or lasted too long in there without… i mean, there weren’t any bones-”

“Sans.” You interject, cutting your tactless fiance off. 

“no, it’s good, i mean, five days straight in there woulda-”

“SANS.” It’s Undyne’s turn. She’s seen how distraught Mettaton looks. She hesitates, and takes a breath. “I think someone should check EbbCo again. Just to be sure.”

“we checked-”

“You don’t know what it was like.” She says flatly, and then looks over at Alphys. “When Alphys was missing, when she was under EbbCo, and I just _knew_ it, and we couldn’t do anything-” She trails off, then looks at Mettaton. “I mean, pal, you gettin’ any strong ‘just knowing where he is’ vibes, or-” Mettaton looks at her, lost, and brushes the hair out of his eyes. 

“No.” He mutters. “I… perhaps it’s because we aren’t… meant to be, the same way that you and Alphys or Sans and _______…. Look, Sans, you don’t have to laugh.” He interrupts himself to glare at Sans, who has, yes, snorted out a laugh.

Papyrus, silent up until this point, speaks up. “HE THINKS IT’S FUNNY BECAUSE YOU’RE WRONG. THAT’S VERY MEAN OF YOU, BROTHER.” 

“yeah.” Sans says with a small shrug, and then, when Mettaton narrows his eyes, he says, “who the hell says you guys aren’t meant to be together? mettaton. the dude has a shiny metal soul, for fuck’s sake.” (Had, you think guiltily). “i mean, if that doesn’t say ‘made for the robot,’ i’m not really sure what-”

“Nonsense.” Mettaton says, but he’s smiling a little, his eyes downcast. “Well. Still. It’s… it’s not as if I feel him anywhere.” 

“We’ll check EbbCo again.” You promise him. “See if the security guards have turned up any video, either. Maybe there’s footage of him leaving with someone.” 

“There’s no security cameras at all on the executive floor.” Mettaton sighs, and then, when you all look at him quizzically, he shrugs. “I, er, visited him at lunch a few times.” 

“...yep.” Sans decides to move past that. He glances at you. “i still don’t want you down in those caves.”

“Same.” You agree, covering the Dot reflexively with one hand. “But maybe if you went with Nat and Shadow… you could at least see if anything had changed? And I could definitely check out the rest of the building. I mean, I know EbbCo.” 

“I’d like to go in the caves as well.” Mettaton says firmly. Sans eyes him, then grimaces and nods.

“sure. just… you know. it’s… upsetting, down there.”

“I think there’s not terribly much that could upset me any further right now.” Mettaton admits. 

“well… we’ll see.” Sans says, then looks at you. “nat and shadow really necessary? s’just… those jars-”

“Jars?”

“we’ll talk about it.” Sans says, ignoring Mettaton’s confusion. You grimace. 

“Well… how good’s your dark vision compared to Shadow’s?”

“...shit.” He admits. “and… many eyes, right. they might have noticed something i didn’t.”

“Well. Let’s call them and then we’ll head out.” You sigh, then raise an eyebrow. “After all. When did splitting up and going into dark, scary, possibly haunted caves ever NOT work out?”

“...Possibly haunted?” Undyne, Alphys and Mettaton say at the same time. 

“it’s this whole thing.” Sans says knowledgeably.   
Oh, this is stupid. 

Still. Even knowing that it’s stupid, you end up doing the thing. Sans gets a hold of Nat and Shadow, and takes off to pick them up with Mettaton; the four of them are going speulunking. Undyne insists on going with you to the main EbbCo building. Alphys makes a half-hearted pitch to join you, but Undyne shakes her head. 

“No, sweetie. If there is some weird shit - well. I know you don’t like being at EbbCo at all, since the… besides. If he comes home, you and Papyrus will be here to greet him, right?”

“R-right.” Alphys says glumly, and then locks eyes with both of you. “J-just… b-be safe, okay? And s-smart?”

“I’m always smart.” Undyne says, and Alphys coughs a little. “Hey. Rude.”

“It’s j-just… this is… w-we just don’t want this to become a s-story about m-monsters breaking into EbbCo. Things are p-pretty good between humans and monsters right n-now. W-we shouldn’t risk it.” Alphys stammers. Undyne blinks, and crouches down a little. 

“Sweetie… I wish you would tell me what was wrong.” She murmurs. “Is this about the Asgore project? I thought you didn’t have to work on that anymore.”

“I d-don’t!” She says, then looks down again. “I d-don’t want to give him a r-reason to start back up again.” You look at her critically, wishing she would just.. SAY what was wrong, what was upsetting her so much. She’d seemed so much happier recently (since Asgore had released her from whatever that top secret project was) but…

“We’ll be safe.” Undyne insists, and kisses her twice, once on the tip of her snout, once on her lips. “You be good too.”

“I w-will.” She mutters. 

\-------------------------------------

 

Your search of the above-ground portions of EbbCo is just… pointless. You know that, and you suspect Undyne knows that, but you try again anyway. You cut a door into Capra’s office, pausing to feed the hungry fish.

“Know his password?” Undyne asks, looking at the computer. 

“God no. Try, um… ‘boobies.’” You propose. Undyne snorts and leans over the keyboard, then whispers,

“Oh my god!”

“What!?” You exclaim. “Was it really - oh. You’re hilarious. Very professional. We’re trying to find a missing friend here.”

“I’m trying ‘dicks.’” She retorts, then blinks. “Oh man, there’s a combination of words I never thought would come out of my mouth.” You snort. You miss this. Not, necessarily, the sleuthing to find your missing friend, but spending time with Undyne was always fun. 

Still, the thorough search of his office turns up nothing, other than a hidden box of nearly expired condoms (gross), an even better hidden copy of Fifty Shades of Gray (gross gross), and a notepad that has some very rude - and frankly, anatomically inaccurate - doodles of Sans (puke city).

“Welp.” You sigh after a while. “No dice. Lemme think if there’s anywhere else to check. Bye fishies. Undyne, tell my fishies I say goodbye - those used to be mine, you know, he got me the puffers as a gift for not killing him when he groped my arm.” As you explain this, something slowly dawns on you. “Hey. I know one more place worth checking.”

You haven’t been in your old intern’s office (formerly your parents’ office) since the battle under EbbCo. Undyne sticks close to you, her eye wide when you exit the elevator onto the fourth floor - which basically looks like a cubicle farm. 

“Why would he come here?” She asks.

“Something he said at the party. Something about loving my mom and dad. They had a million books and records in that office. Seems like a place he might go, huh?” You reply, pushing the door open. 

Well, _somebody_ had definitely been in here. The old books you’d stuck to as an intern are open on the desk, your translation notebook opened as well.

“Think he found anything?” Undyne’s at your shoulder suddenly. 

“Gah! In my notes? Probably not. He said he loved my mom and dad, not me, so…” You trail off, looking at your old computer. “That’s weird.” 

It’s on. And the green light on the disc drive is indicating… “Was he listening to a CD?” You muse, sinking heavily into your swivel chair and typing in your credentials at the login screen.

It’s not a music CD. It has two files on it: a word document and a PDF. You click the PDF first, and blink. “That’s weird. What does this look like to you?” You ask Undyne.  
“Uhhh…. It looks like a satellite shot of our house. Zoom out.” Undyne urges. You squint, then see that yes, you can zoom out. “This is old.” She’s saying. “Look. Ebott’s still more or less in one piece. This is from before the barrier came down.”

“Riiight.” You say, looking it over. “I remember. You used to be able to see it, from the back windows, on a clear day. It was that bright.”

“Well. Look at this shot. You must have been almost directly across from it. If the spot we all left the underground from was on this side, right here…” Undyne draws an almost perfectly straight line with her finger on the monitor, landing on the familiar roof of your house. “God. Dork, the number of times you and I were probably looking at each other with that barrier in between…”

“Yeah.” You muse, then blink. “Okay, but why is it on this disk?” 

“Dunno. Open the doc.” Undyne urges. You click on the other file in the folder. 

“Shit.” You grumble. “It’s password protected.” 

“Try ‘boobies.’” Undyne urges.

It’s not boobies or dicks or TonyStark or SexyRobot or any of Undyne’s other suggestions. Eventually, you have to groan, and give up. “Maybe Alphys can help crack it,” you’re muttering, when suddenly, out of nowhere, Sans, Nat, Shadow and Mettaton stumble into your office.

“we gotta go talk to the king.” Sans says at once. “sorry. hi. check your phone, you scared me shitless.” 

“Um. Wow. Okay. What’s going on-”

“all those pots down there. the ones filled with dust” He hisses. “i checked again. they’re all empty.”


	145. Wherein You Don't Make A Weird Noise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [A very political and presidential blogday kiddos](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“Shit.” You mutter, standing there and blinking and suddenly feeling very, very nervous.

“shit.” Sans agrees.

“...Wait, what?” Undyne interjects, fixing a big yellow eye intently on Sans.

“I, um, also… would like to know.” Natalie, behind Sans’ shoulder, says. She sounds a little sheepish. Mettaton clears his throat as well, and Shadow shuffles a paw against the office carpeting, his tail twitching. 

Sans looks from person to person, then back at you, momentarily distressed, before he pulls himself together, an expression of calm, smiling confidence plastered onto his face. “so. down in the caves. there’s about a thousand pots and canisters, urns, whatever. i looked in one, when we went down there last time. and i found-”

“Dust?” Undyne’s bewildered. 

“no. **d u s t.** ” Sans says clearly, and you shiver. Undyne’s eye grows almost perfectly round as she slowly understands the implication. 

“I don’t understand.” Shadow interjects. “I mean, that’s… disgusting, but-”

“remember that mural? how human mages got power from our blood? well. dust works too.” Sans growls.

“Oh.” Says Natalie, suddenly looking disgusted. “Oh, god, Dust, it’s-”

“yeah. soylent green.” Sans confirms, gritting his teeth. There’s a moment of silence, then;

“Okay. You’re right. We need to go see the king.” Undyne says. Sans inclines his head slightly, looking upset. 

“it’s… some shit, yeah, but it’s the only way.” He mutters. You’re inclined to agree. You don’t know what the fuck Capra would be doing with all of that dust (Dust?), but you know this, nothing good comes from using that, there is something deeply, terribly wrong and your friends might be in danger and-

Mettaton’s been stock still this entire time. At last, he moves slightly, looking… horrified, himself. His lips part slightly, but he can’t seem to muster the words. He meets your eyes, and all you can see there is fear. Not for what might be coming, but for the man he loves. 

“Shit. Wait. No. We can’t.” You say at once, realizing that he needs you - god, you’re the only person who can stop an escalating situation before it goes right to shit, because the end of this particular trip to the palace is… less than ideal. For Mettaton, certainly. Maybe for Capra. Almost definitely for you. 

Suddenly you’re the center of attention. 

“Why the hell not?!” Undyne’s demanding. 

“Because. Oh god, a million reasons. Because Nat went into a place humans weren’t supposed to go-”

“shit. so did you.” Sans mutters.

“-And we definitely violated a treaty there. And because we can’t very well tell the king what we’re worried about without telling him _who_ we’re worried about, and right now, the only evidence we have is that the Dust is gone, and that human mages used to use it. We don’t know anything else, but right now, if we don’t tell the King what Cap can do, well, I’m the only other human mage he knows, except Frisk, and Frisk certainly didn’t take it, so-”

“shit. yeah. i can just fucking see him locking you up, until the kid’s born. ‘just to be safe.’” Sans mutters.

“Hang on. You said ‘what Cap can do.’ Nat interjects. Shadow paces forward. 

“Yeah. I wanna hear more about that.” 

You exchange glances with Undyne, then Sans, then Mettaton at last. 

“So. Capra’s a mage-” Undyne begins, but Mettaton’s lip curls and he cuts her off. 

“ _Was_ a mage. She took it away.” 

“Supposedly.” Undyne mutters, glancing guiltily at you. 

“You’ve seen his soul!” Mettaton snarls. “What do you think, that he made himself look like that? For … to deceive us? That magic broke him! _I_ broke him! If I’d just stayed away, he would have been... “ He trails off, realizing how much his voice has risen in his fear and anger. “It’s gone now. He wanted it gone.” He finally mutters.

“mettaton.” Sans says slowly, perhaps building up for a pep talk. You want to speak too, but the only thing that can come to your head is a watered down Robin Williams impression, that scene from Good Will Hunting, just repeating ‘it’s not your fault.’ 

“I know.” Mettaton manages to steer Sans away from the reassurances he wants to offer. “Look. We all know him. Is this really… is something like this really something he would do? Not just… some grand scheme, we all know he’d do that. But Dust? He loves monsters.”

“He loves _a_ monster.” Undyne says pointedly. “You haven’t spent much time with him recently. He’s… off.”

“Sorry, she took his _soul_???” Shadow interjects. “What kind of magic can he even do? How the hell are we supposed to-”

“We have to trust him.” You say quietly. 

“Trust him?! We don’t even know him, apparently-” Shadow begins, but Natalie shakes her head. 

“We know what we need to.” She says gently. 

“Oh yeah? What’s that?!” Undyne retorts, arching her eyebrow.

“We know he greeted the monsters with open arms.” She reminds your group. “He hired you, Shadow. Who else even looked twice, and you’re smarter than anyone I know!” Sans makes a disquieted grumble at that. “I know he saw a short, chubby, miserable looking girl with arthritic knees in PT and he decided that she needed a friend.”

“Yeah, well… what about her?” Undyne jerks her head at you. “What kind of guy doesn’t check up on a ten year old orphan, even though he was sooo in love with her parents or whatever?!”

“He still came for me when it counted.” You remind her. “And for you, Undyne. And Sans. He went charging into that cavern, down here, even though he knew it was filled with guys with guns. He stayed, too. He stared Gaster down when… Gaster was the most terrifying thing I’d ever seen, and he tried to punch that asshole too.” You swallow. “I trust him.” You mutter, weighing those words carefully. “Whatever he’s doing, he’s… it can’t be anything bad. He doesn’t even _do_ anything bad, he just, you know, he has that face-”

“Excuse me?” Mettaton says, indignant, then sighs. “I trust him too, of course. With my life, if necessary.” 

“Me too.” Nat says, and Shadow only eyes her for a moment before he groans, his paw finding her hand. 

“Suppose I do too, then. I mean, you’re right. He’s a lot of things, and he might get every workable hour out of his interns, but… you know, hell, the guy offers a paid internship, as far as I’m concerned that’s proof positive he’s on the good team.” 

Undyne huffs, crossing her arms, then looks at you. “Shit. Goddamn it. Fine. We won’t tell the king. About any of this. But… fuck. Oh, I am going to kick that nerd’s ass as soon as he shows up, I swear…”

“babe.” Sans says softly, looking at you. “are you… really, really sure? i mean.”

“I know.” You mutter. “‘Don’t trust him.’” 

“it’s just… this seems like one of those moments, you know? one of those uh, turning points in time. what we do here hinges a lot on if we can trust him, and then you left yourself a damn note, and-”

“I know. But you know what? If I were warning myself in the past not to trust Cap, I don’t think I would say ‘don’t trust him,’ I think I’d say ‘This time Capra actually did turn out to be the bad guy, you’re making a huge mistake, don’t invite him to live with you or reassure him that he still looks handsome with his scar or bring him brownies or one weird time see him with just a towel on,’ you know?”

“...ok, we can talk about that last bit later.” Sans mutters, then groans and shakes his head. “you’re right. we gotta… i trust him too. but. something’s still going down.” He makes sure to make eye contact with everyone before he continues. “we all need to be safe. and smart. and… alert.” 

“If we see some spooky magic shit, say some spooky magic shit?” Nat says, then pulls a face. “That’s not a great slogan.” 

“well. basically, though.” He clears his throat. “we’ve gotta stay safe. call each other if we see anything. me and her, we can get you wherever you need to be, just call us. and don’t be a hero. don’t do anything alone, if you do find something. ok?” He checks, and is greeted with a soft refrain of “okay”s. “good.” He says, then eyes Mettaton. “got any more ideas for the search party, bud?” 

“No.” Mettaton says, then runs his hand through his hair. “I can only hope… wherever he is, I hope he’s not doing something stupid.” 

Sans stares at him for a second, then very tentatively says;

“...maybe hope for something a little more likely.”   
\-------------------------------------------------------

The search party disassembles at this point. You offer to take Nat and Shadow home, but they decline - they’re parked at your house anyway. So, hell, you all go home. Undyne peels off to tell Alphys about your discovery, Mettaton retreats into his room to… well, probably to be miserable. You and Sans look at each other.

“we should probably be doing some sleuthing.” He says reluctantly. You pause, then say;

“Look, when the thing happens, it’ll happen. We just need to be ready. Like you said.” He’s looking at you, his brow furrowed, like something’s not quite right, but eventually his face relaxes. 

“yeah. i suppose you’re right. what time is it?”

“Almost two already. I need some lunch.” You reply. “Let’s find Paps and just make sure-”

“I AM OVERHEARING. I ASSUME YOU COULDN’T FIND PETER. DON’T WORRY, HE’S SAVING THE WORLD! AND, ______, I AM SAVING THE WORLD BY MAKING FRENCH ONION SOUP!” Papyrus interjects in an enthusiastic screech from the kitchen.

“eavesdropping’s rude, bro!” Sans calls out.

“IT ISN’T MY FAULT THAT YOU ARE THE LOUDEST TALKER OF ALL TIME!” Somehow, Papyrus doesn’t seem to sense the irony. 

“Well, come join us in the family room when you’re done, Paps. We gotta talk about… safety stuff.”

“VERY WELL. I WILL WEAR MY HELMET.” Papyrus sighs, and you chuckle quietly, a waft of soup reaching your nose. 

“Oh man, that smells good. I’m starving!” Sans looks affectionately at you 

“yeah. when aren’t you?” 

“Har har. You are very, very funny. You are the funniest skeleton of all time.” You grumble, tugging him to the couch and sinking to a seat. “Oooof. My back hurts. My hips hurt. I huurrrrrt.” 

“sorry, darlin’.” He collapses to a seat next to you, but at least he nudges at your legs until you swing them up onto his lap, then, without asking, starts rubbing your feet. 

“This is all your fault, you know.” You say, folding your hands over your belly and trying not to smile. 

“yep.” 

“Condoms not necessary, my ass.” You can’t even maintain a good grumble.

“yep, i am very bad. the worst.” He agrees patiently, then peers over at you. “babe. about not doing stupid things-”

“I’m not gonna!” You laugh indignantly. “But I am totally not on child care duty this time, either. I’m useful these days.” 

“i know you are. as long as you’ve got your magic, anyway.” 

“Well, now we know how easy it is for me to get my magic, so - blorp.” You trail off, tilting your head to the side, a puzzled look crossing your face involuntarily. 

“‘blorp’???” He repeats incredulously.

“I feel…” You trail off again, closing your eyes, concentrating. After almost a minute goes by, he pipes up.

“babe, kinda freaking me out right now…” 

“Sorry! Sorry, it’s just…” You open your eyes and look into the middle distance, gazing down at your belly. When you feel it happen again, this time, you’re certain. “They’re moving.” You say softly. “I just felt them move.”

“nice try, i’m not falling for a future fart joke again-”

“Sans. Look.” You urge. He checks your stomach reflexively, then pulls in a quick, reflexive breath as the Dot’s soul shifts in place, just a little.

“they’re moving.” He repeats numbly, processing, then looks up at you. “they’re moving!” He says, eyesockets very wide. “are they supposed to be-”

“It’s sixteen weeks. It’s a little early, but…” You trail off, grinning, and shrug.

“holy shit.” He says, then leans very close to your belly, the lights in his eyes fixed on that little soul. “hi.” He whispers quietly. The Dot moves a little again. Can they hear him? Could they already know?

“That’s your dad.” You tell your stomach patiently, then blink. “Oh. That… is that weird? I feel like I’m talking to like, the taco I had yesterday.”

“‘s not weird.” He says distractedly, then looks up at you, eyes still wide. “wow. that’s so cool. wow. wow. they’re really… wow. and you can feel that?”

“A little.” You admit. “I mean… I think. Definitely once. Now that I’m looking at them, it might be in my head.” 

“wow. holy shit. wow. we gotta get you back to the vet.” 

… Well, okay, that was not exactly a sentence you’d be saving in the baby book. 

“Can we at least call him a doctor?” You beg quietly, then sigh. “Fine. Fine. We’ll make an appointment. We’ll go to the… blerg, we’ll go to the goddamn vet.”


	146. Sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [no puppet. no puppet. you're the puppet.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

**One.**

When you find something worth keeping, you hang on tight. You hang on so fucking tight. You drag yourself up no matter how many times you’ve been struck down, no matter how many outside forces are trying to destroy you. You hang on tight. You clench your teeth, you let the blood drip, the bones break, and you fight back. Even when you know you’ll lose, you refuse to let go. You would rather die than let go.

That’s Sans’ theory, anyway.

You’re asleep. The big October moon is spilling in through the window, illuminating just enough that he can make out the steady rise and fall of your chest.

Sometimes, nights like this, he can’t sleep. He sees you there, the worry and fear having fallen off your face. He watches the regular flares of your soul, the slight sputters, that black core burning within, reminding him of all you’d had to do just to stay alive. 

He’s been thinking about that night below EbbCo, the night it had almost all gone to shit, the night that he’d almost lost you. If he closed his eyes, he could still picture it; that massive, impossible, jittering amalgamation of bones jutting out into space he couldn’t comprehend. An ivory spider, an abomination, lunging for you, making it very clear that death was, perhaps, the best possible thing that could happen to you as soon as his d- 

… as soon as _Gaster_ laid hands on you. 

He’d had so many hands. 

Your own hand had been slippery with sweat. The human body can do amazing things, he reminds himself. It makes this thing called adrenaline. It’s like magic. It can keep you alert. Keep you alive. He knows this. He’s seen this. Sometimes he can even still smell it, the scent of fear radiating off of you, and he’ll catch himself baring his teeth, pulling you to his chest, keeping you close (oh god, he can’t let go), and yet… 

He swallows roughly, and curls closer to you, moving his arm tight around you and then retreating slightly, splaying his fingers over your old Nirvana t-shirt, over that speck of light in your womb that is just starting to move. Old books, they called that the quickening. The first sign of life. 

Well, he’d had plenty of signs with the little Dot, but…

Oh god. Another thing he can’t stand to lose. When it all goes down, when the Thing happens, when you all stop climbing the hill of this rollercoaster and begin the inevitable descent, the kid’s gonna be in the picture, even if they’re born by that point. Another thing to hang on tight to.

What had gone through the minds of your parents as they skidded - if they had skidded - off the side of the road?

He suspects they must have been thinking of you. Of how they couldn’t stand to lose you.

He can’t stand to lose any of this.

Inhale. 

Exhale.

Something’s coming.

The Dust is gone, and someone had needed that power for something, and he wants to trust, and he can’t trust, and something’s coming.

When you’ve got something worth keeping, you hang on tight. 

He hangs on tight. 

He heeds the little voice in his head that tells him to try to sleep.

 

\---------------------------------------

**Two.**

He was being good.

He was always good, but right now, he was being particularly good.

You and Sans had sat down and reminded him about safety, about being alert, about how sometimes the friendliest people were the ones who tried to hurt you. He’d nodded and agreed and hugged and tried to make the lesson sink in. He’d really, really tried to learn. 

The thing was, he thinks (tossing in his bed, fiddling anxiously with his stuffed mastodon‘s ear) that he wasn’t _stupid_. 

Something’s happening, and Sans is, once again, trying to protect him. 

Sans never accounts for the fact that his younger brother is - could be - good at things like this. 

He was being good.

He was good. 

His brother always kept him in the dark, and Papyrus, he was just a little afraid of the dark. Not that he was going to tell anyone about that. Except Ghost. But Ghost was very good at keeping secrets. 

Secrets weren’t good, though. Secrets were what had allowed his dad - his - his - his Gaster, to sneak up on him, surprise him while he was watering the daylilies. 

“They’re beautiful.” Dad had said  
“Oh, thank you, yes, I work very hard on them, they’re a rare and exotic breed, but luckily I, Papyrus, master florist-

No. He shouldn’t lie to himself. It hadn’t gone like that. 

He’d frozen, made a sound like a kettle screaming, and Da...ster, he’d slowly inched back, holding up his hands, exposing the holes in the palms as he whispered,

“It’s alright, son. I’m not going to hurt-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t…” He’d stopped, swallowed, then tried again. “Papyrus. My son. I know-w-w I have no way to even begin-n-”

“YOU TRIED TO HURT SANS! AND ________! AND PETER! YOU BROKE PETER!” He’d shrieked, holding his watering can up defensively. His dad had taken a few steps backwards.

“I…. I know. I was…” He’d stopped talking for a long time, then slouched. “I was… not myself. F-f-f.”

“SANS WOULDN’T LIKE THIS! LEAVE ME AL-”

“I’m sorry. This-s-s-s-s-sssssss…. was a bad idea. I’m s-s-s-s-s-sssssssss…..” Gaster paused, clutched his head, then whispered. “I am trying to make amends. Papyrus. I am…. always here. If you need me. I will keep you and your loved ones safe. I will atone. I must-t-t-t-t-t-t…”

Papyrus hadn’t known about all that. But…

Hadn’t Sans taught him about forgiveness, too? How we didn’t need to always hurt, how to let things go?

Sans had said that’s what good people did.

He was good. 

His door creaks open, and he stiffens, ready to shout, then relaxes when he sees that it’s just Ghost. He and the cat have a routine now. He moves his stuffed animal off to the side, forcing himself to stop worrying at its ear, and smiles a little when Ghost hops up onto his bed, and settles, draping himself over Papyrus’ spinal column, just below his ribs. Ghost is warm and soft and it feels like a hug.

He lets the rumbling purrs coax him to sleep.

\------------------------------------------  
 **Three.**

She watches her wife’s soul in the darkness.

If she had two eyes, she’d understand better, she thinks bitterly, not for the first time. But nooooo. Undyne had needed, desperately needed to play with her spear, and… well, it wasn’t as if she’d had anyone around to tell her that kids shouldn’t play with sharp objects.

And so Asgore had eventually taken the world’s smallest, scrappiest, angriest little morality story under his wing, and that had fixed so much, but there were some things you couldn’t ever fix, and it turned out eyes were…

Well. She didn’t have depth perception. 

Maybe that’s why she lacked depth, too. Plenty of people had said that, that she was just… well, that what you saw with her was what you got. She doesn’t love that. She wants to be more. She just isn’t great at the words, and she can’t see her wife’s soul the way everyone else can, and-

“Hey.” Her voice cuts through the darkness, and Alphys, who definitely, most definitely isn’t asleep, she makes a show of stirring. 

“Mmmh?”

“...We’re okay, right?” Undyne says quietly. There’s a pause, then;

“Of c-course. Why would you ask-”

“Because!” Her voice is rougher than she means it to be. “Because everything’s starting up again. And I didn’t keep you safe last time. And … you stopped talking about the baby as soon as I told you what happened today and…” She pauses, swallows. “I’ll do better this time.” She whispers at last. “I’ll keep you safe. Is that why? Is that why we can’t talk about kids anymore, because I let you get hurt?”

\---------------------------------------------

**Four.**

“W-what?! No!” She exclaims, her heart hammering. “Undyne. Sweetie. No!”

“Then why?” Her wife demands, and she gulps, wanting to wriggle out of her skin. The pause grows heavy, the silence deadly.

“I-I-I…. I’m gonna mess it up. I mess everything up. You’ll see.” She finally whispers. Undyne growls, then sits straight up in bed.

“No. Honey. You don’t. You’re… god, you’re amazing. You just never see all the good things you do-”

“-I did a bad thing.” She admits, then falls utterly still.

“What do you mean?” Undyne whispers, after another cloying silence. 

“I. I t-think…. I t-t-think I made something bad. I was t-trying to make something good, but…”

“Baby.” Undyne is urgent. “Please. Please tell me.” 

“I c-c-c-c-can’t! Asgore would be so m-m-m-m-mad-”

“Fuck Asgore.” Undyne barks. “I love him, you know that, but I love you more. What’s-”

“T-they’re gonna use it.” She whispers. “I k-know they will. Undyne, he’s got Gaster. Gaster was always smarter than me. He’ll have finished it, and then - it’s supposed - it’s not supposed - I wasn’t trying to hurt anyone!”

“Alphys…” Undyne whispers.

“...S-something will happen. Asgore will use my machine. I … we can’t do this to our baby, Undyne. We can’t l-let them grow up, knowing what their mother d-did.” She whispers. “I was j-just trying to h-h-help…”

“Baby.” Undyne whispers. “Please. Just… tell me.”

She’s silent. She stays there, curled up into a little defensive ball, and Undyne doesn’t hesitate, she leans in anyway, moves around her, holds her close, almost too close.

Eventually, they both fall asleep.

\--------------------------------------------------------------  
 **Five.**

Why does he trust him?

In private, he’s a clicking, whirring mess. Tomorrow, he’ll go out, he’ll make breakfast, he’ll appease everyone, he’ll remind everyone of yet another selfless thing Peter had done. He’ll do this ad nauseum, a repeating process, until everyone’s on board. He has to.

Being in love is something like a programming command. He’ll do this, because there’s no other option, because a switch inside of him has been irreversibly flipped, because loving Peter isn’t an option. It never had been. 

One day, he’d watched Peter wake, all tousle-haired and leonine and lean and perfect, and the cruel expression hadn’t flickered onto his face. He’d looked at Mettaton and he’d smiled, and that had been all it had taken for all those confusing, conflicting thoughts to switch into place, to distill, clarify. He loved Peter. 

Peter thought he knew why that happened. 

He trusted Peter.

He’d gone through his memory, god, thousands of times now.

There were two hundred and thirteen discrete instances where Peter had casually said “Trust me.”

He trusted Peter.

He had to trust Peter.

It wasn’t magic. 

He has to trust that it wasn’t magic. 

He has to trust that the only thing that’s remotely magic about all of this is that he’d finally, finally found his person, and that person loved him back, and this was real, this was real, everything else was fake in his life, everything else was lights and makeup and costume but this was real.

This had to be real. 

He’ll just run one more scan.

He falls still, memories flickering on the back of his eyelids, filling his ears as the night drags on. 

\--------------------------------------------------

**Six.**

You’re asleep.

Something’s stirring.

Something’s stirring. 

Something’s stirring.


	147. Wherein The Bad Thing Happens

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [nasty woman.](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

When time resets, it smells like ozone.

 

He knows that smell now, the scent of the air just after a thunderstorm, but back then, oh god, back then he hadn’t known what it was and when he smells it now it triggers a panic deep into his soul. 

 

He knows what’s coming next. It’s happened a thousand times before. The sheer force, the oppressive weight of power he can’t understand, pushing him, pushing everyone, everything back, rewinding, undoing, it’s like a tidal wave he’s helpless against. The scent of ozone. The horror of it all crashing down at once, of every meaningful thing he’s done washing away, and there’s red eyes, and _you_ , he’ll lose you, and oh god, and the baby, and he’ll know, oh, oh god, this time he’ll _know_ because unlike everyone else, he never could quite forget, he’ll wake up with the smell of ozone and your conditioner and a child that never was that he loved and it’s happening, it’s happening, he’ll wake up in that same bed he’d just shared with you, and-

 

He gasps and wakes up.

 

Your fingers are twisted into his ribs - your hair is half in his mouth, and you’re asleep, and even smiling, just a little, and the sun is hitting your face and he gasps again, and then he can’t help it, he lets out a low, helpless, petrified string of laughter - it’s not really laughter, but you’re _there_ still, and Dot is there still, and you’re rousing, looking a little grumpy and it’s _fine_.

 

“Whasso funny?” You mumble, and he laughs again, pulling you closer. 

 

“nothin’. bad dream.” He mumbles, and you open your eyes wider, moving your head so it’s tucked against his shoulder. 

 

“It sounds hilarious.” You say cautiously, and he laughs again, and this time it’s almost real.  
“real rib tickler.” He murmurs. Your eyes narrow. 

 

“It’s too early for puns.” You complain, but then you sit up and look him over properly, and seeing you, all rumpled in your Nirvana shirt and your hair everywhere, even with that worry on your face, he’s just helpless. “Baby, are you okay?”

 

“yeah. yeah.” He sighs. “just… relieved. bad nightmare. one of the ol’ regulars. underground stuff.” He watches understanding dawn across your face, and you watch him only for a moment longer before you lie back down, moving your head onto his sternum and just holding him. 

 

“‘S okay.” You whisper sleepily. “You’re here now. I got you. You never gotta go back.”

 

You love him so much. He knows that now. Sometimes, you even sound like him. 

 

“will you…” He begins, then falls silent. You sit up once more. This time, your eyes open all the way, and you look down - this time you _look_ \- and see the tumult in his soul, and he hears your sharp intake of breath.

 

“Of course.” You whisper, but first, first, you lean down and you kiss him softly, the way he rarely allows, lips against bone. “It’s okay.” You repeat softly. “I promise. I’ve got you. We’ve got you.” 

 

It barely feels like anything when you ease his soul out into the open. Sometimes it can feel like a raw nerve, but he’s looking at you, and you’re watching the riot in his soul, all the fractured blues, like ice, like broken glass, and all he sees is love and worry in your eyes, and… determination. Resolve, that you’re going to make it all better, that you will keep him grounded during the storm.

 

Your fingers brush his soul, and, oh, that first wave of love rolls through - not a tidal wave, no, just… just a tide. Something he can neither deny nor resist.

 

“Oh… Sans…” You whisper, your eyes focused off in the distance as you comprehend his fear, and he wraps his fingers around your wrist.

 

“it’s ok.” He manages, half staggered by another powerful surge of love. “it’s ok. you’re here.”

 

“Always.” You agree softly. “No matter what.”

 

And with your hand on his soul, he believes you. He believes that no matter what fuckery might occur… the two of you - no, the _three of you_ \- will find your way back together.

 

\--------------------------------------------------

 

It had been a rough night, and well… a bumpy morning, to say the least, but you felt the way you always felt, once you touched his soul. At peace. Content. Mushier than was strictly necessary. But, well… it was upsetting to see him that freaked out by the dream, and so relieving to now see him, more or less calm, more or less his usual self. Just… clingy. And right now, you didn’t exactly mind clingy.

 

Actually Undyne and Alphys, sitting opposite you at the kitchen table, were also a little clingy. You wondered vaguely how their morning had gone, hoping it had been better than yours. Then, well, Sans yawned, and you were still so hopped up on his soul that you had to stop eating for a second to note how cute his yawns were.

 

Mettaton and Papyrus, islands of solidarity at the end of the table, exchange a glance.

 

Okay. Maybe you were a lot mushier than strictly necessary. You resolve to dial that down some, but then Sans rubs the back of your neck, then gazes into your eyes and says;

 

“we gotta go to the vet.” 

 

Okay. That’s officially a buzzkill.

 

“I know. I know.”

 

“‘pointment’s in ten minutes.”

 

“Yep.”

 

“you’re pouting.” He points out with a grin, and you sigh. 

 

“I know I’m being silly. And Dr. Stanley is a good man to do this for us. It’s just… not what I pictured, going to a vet. Sitting on a metal table that still has clawmarks on it next to an ad for, like, heartworm protection.” You admit. Sans’ grin falters at once.

 

“...i wish there was a better place.” He admits. 

 

“Wish you humans could just lay eggs.” Undyne snorts. “It’s way easier!”

 

“don’t brag.” Sans gripes, then arches a browbone. “who’s gonna have the egg, anyway?” Alphys and Undyne exchange glances, then Alphys blushes and Undyne grins and shrugs.

 

“We had a talk this morning.” She explains, soft (for her). “And… we’re just gonna leave that one up to chance. See what happens.”

 

“Oh!” You hadn’t thought it would work that way, but now that you think about how the Dot had come to be… “Ohhhh…” You add thoughtfully, then turn to glower at Sans. “Why couldn’t we leave it up to chance, huh?” The thought of him sixteen weeks pregnant kind of hurts your head, but at the same time you have to wonder; “Wait, could we have? I mean, could you-”

 

“we did.” Sans says wryly, then shrugs. “dunno. never tried to uh, carry a child. pretty sure that’s not one of the tricks i can play. though with us, i got lots more questions than answers.”

 

“Hah, same. Like, how do you guys-” 

 

“Undyne, no.” You cut her off distractedly, used to that sort of thing by now. “You’re making Papyrus blush.”

 

“AM NOT.”

 

“You’re making Mettaton sick to his stomach.” Mettaton grumbles.

 

“you don’t have any food in you to be sick with.” Sans drawls.

 

“Well, neither do you. ________, darling, isn’t Sans supposed to eat food?!” Mettaton says smugly, and Sans’ eyesockets narrow at the betrayal before he hops up, suddenly urgent.

 

“c’mon, babe, we gotta go.”

 

“God, you’ll do anything to get out of a muffin, won’t you!?” You laugh.

 

“i’ll eat later. lessgo!” 

 

“You’re such a baby.” You sigh, and hop up - well, push yourself up - from the table with a groan, tracing a door to the copse of trees outside Dr. Stanley’s office.

 

“HAVE FUN AT THE VET’S! SAY HI TO ALL OF THE DOGS AND CATS FOR ME!” Papyrus calls.

 

“Thank you for that.” You grumble.

 

“YOU’RE WELCOME!” He entirely misses the sarcasm. You can’t help it; you chuckle at him, and then allow Sans to tug you through the door. 

 

You’ll give him the muffin you slipped in your pocket in the waiting room. 

 

\-------------------------------------------

 

A half hour later, and you’re in the back of the vet’s office again. Your stomach, once again, is covered with goop, and you are, yes, stretched out over a metal exam table - a different one, this time. 

 

“We use this exam room for large animals.” Dr. Stanley says, fiddling on a knob on the ultrasound machine. 

 

Sans is a saint, and doesn’t even smile. 

 

You grit your teeth.

 

“Well…” The vet looks up, and seems to realize at last that maybe that hadn’t been tactful. “Are you ready to see your baby? I think, this time, we’ll have a much clearer view. And you’re sixteen weeks along, correct?” He checks, pressing the plastic device down against your skin, pushing in a little bit. 

 

“Yes. Oh that’s cold!” You laugh, startled, and Sans scoops up your hand. 

 

“everything all good, doc?” He inquires at once, watching as the doctor squints at the monitor. “i mean, i know, you can’t really know yet, ‘specially since Dot’s half skeleton and everything, just…” 

 

“Hmm.” The vet mutters, and your heart suddenly thunders in your ears. That’s not a ‘don’t worry, your baby is beautiful and perfect and thriving and-’ “It’s… textbook.” The doctor says, mystified, then tilts the screen so you can see it. 

 

Last time, Dot had looked like a smudge, a squiggle, something that could be made out to be an actual baby more or less though imagination. This time…

 

“It’s textbook.” The vet repeats. “I mean that literally. I have been studying textbooks to prepare for this, and…”

 

Oh, the Dot has little arms, little legs… a frankly enormous head, but that was normal, that was normal…

 

“wow.” Sans can’t come up with much more than that. You bite your lip, trying to figure out all of the emotions that come to a head as the baby in the ultrasound monitor moves, and you feel that corresponding tiny shift inside of you…

 

“They know their dad’s voice.” You murmur, then blink. “Is that right? Can they hear yet? I mean, could they know… could they, though? Hear him?”

 

Dr. Stanley studies the machine for a moment, ignoring your question, his brow furrowed.

 

“doc, is something wrong?” Sans notices at once, and his grip on your hand tightens.

 

“I… I’m not… “ The doctor says, sounding puzzled, totally focused on the screen, then he glances up at you again. “According to everything I’ve studied, we should be able to determine the gender at this point-”

 

“what? ‘s that all? jeez!” Sans exhales heavily. “we don’t care.”

 

“Yeah, we don’t want to know. Not that it even matters. I mean, Frisk…” You begin, then trail off, since Dr. Stanley probably doesn’t care.

 

“Well… I don’t think I _could_ tell you.” The doctor murmurs. “I thought it was the machine, at first, or my lack of expertise, but this child is…” He trails off, and then you all see it. For a split second, a flash of time, that textbook baby is gone, a tiny, perfect skeleton in its place. It kicks its little leg, and then boom - that familiar human silhouette returns.

 

A heavy silence lingers over the room as you all process this.

 

“welp.” Sans finally says. “guess we know they’re mine.” He’s grinning to himself, and slowly, you let out a disbelieving chuckle.

 

“The fetus is changing shape.” Dr. Stanley finishes the obvious thought.

 

“Ho. Lee. Shit.” You finally mutter, then look at Sans again. He looks like every single birthday’s come at once. 

 

“our kid’s so cool!” He whispers reverently. 

 

“Our kid’s Mystique.” You reply, your eyes wide, thinking about this. “Oh god. Baby, we’re gonna need nametags or something. Very distinctive clothes. Oh god, I’m going to misplace this child.”

 

“wonder what they can turn into…”

 

“Oh, god, I hope nothing sharp.” You mutter, holding your stomach reflexively.

 

“nah. look at that soul. kid with a soul like that wouldn’t ever hurt their mom.” Sans reassures you, still beaming.

 

“Wow.” You whisper. 

 

“Well. We are certainly entering… uncharted waters.” The vet says softly - you’d almost forgotten him. “You asked if the fetus could hear already. I think we can safely assume that this particular… baby... “ He blinks at the screen, then swallows. “This child could be able to do almost anything.” He finally pronounces. 

 

“cooooooool….” An awestruck skeleton concurs.


	148. Wherein You Pay A Really Just Pleasant Visit To A Friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [I'm David S. Pumpkins](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“A shapeshifter, though.” You’re beginning to warm up to the idea.

 

“yesssssss.” Sans’ eyes are so bright right now, you have to grin. The vet had finally, after much headscratching, given you the okay to go home. 

 

(“Well, the baby certainly looks fine. I just… this is not anyhing I’ve studied…” was what he had actually said, by way of a puzzled goodbye).

 

Now you were back, and the news was, slowly but surely, sinking in. You’d squirreled away in one of the rooms nobody ever went into - this one was like… a sitting room? A sunroom? Well, it was dusty and a little drafty, but it was a good place to talk.

 

“That is… well, it is pretty cool.” You say again, settling onto the couch next to him, and coughing when a puff of dust comes out of the couch. 

 

“it’s the coolest.” Sans snickers. “man… my kid…” His eyes go wide. “they’ll be safe. they can be what they want. they won’t get the looks or the shit-”

 

“They shouldn’t have to use their powers to _hide!_ ” You cut him off, and for a moment, you both stare at each other, probably both remembering the last time you’d bumped up against this; right after you’d gotten the skarm, and he’d reminded you it was okay to hide it. “There’s nothing wrong with what they are.” You say quietly, after a moment of deadlock. You’re feeling a little alarmed, and a staggering amount protective of Dot at the moment - they could be, they should be allowed to be whatever they wanted to be! Sans seems to realize he’s misstepped by the way you’ve unconsciously moved, your hand splayed protectively over the spot where your child’s soul danced. He sighs, and shakes his head after a moment. 

 

“i know. just… they could be safe. not like us. they could walk down the street and not have baseball guys swing bats at them.” He says helplessly. Your eyes widen - you didn’t like to think about that. Still:

 

“We’re still their parents.” You remind him. “Like it or not, I don’t think that they’re gonna have the easiest path through life. People will still… be shitty and awful.” You conclude unhappily. “Sometimes that’s just how people are.”

 

“i want them to be safe.” He mutters, and for a second, you feel terrible, feel like you’ve stolen that joy from him. 

 

“Hey.” You say, running your fingers over his jaw until he looks up at you. “They will be safe. As safe as they can be. I mean… nobody’s ever perfectly safe. Look at me. I had a perfect life, until something happened to my parents.”

 

“is this supposed to be _reassuring?!_ ” He snorts, and you roll your eyes. 

 

“I’m just saying. There’s no guarantees. But this kid is gonna have you. And me. And Undyne and Alphys and Mettaton and…” 

 

“and pete.” He completes the thought firmly. “he’ll… it’ll…”

 

“It’ll be okay?” You can’t help it. It becomes a question. Sans sucks in a breath. 

 

“yeah. it’ll be ok.” He agrees, and rests his head on your shoulder, looking tired. You’re about to feel guilty again, but then he mutters, “a shapeshifter,” in that same awed tone, and you have to grin. 

 

“You know any of those?” You ask.

 

“one or two.” He says, then grins at you. “most of the time, kids get the same kinda magic their parents have. some kids, though… for whatever reason, they’re just wildcards.”

 

“Coooool!” It’s your turn.

 

“yeah. really cool.” He laughs, then looks excitedly at you. “can we tell people?”

 

“Oh!” It hadn’t occurred to you. “Can we?” You scratch your head distractedly, and then grin. “You know, some people have gender reveal parties. We could have this. This is cooler.” 

 

“whattya mean?”

 

“Oh, like, I don’t know, they cut a cake and it’s full of pink or blue M&Ms so they can announce that way that it’s a girl or a boy I guess.” 

 

“ohhh…” He says, then grins. “so we’d have a cake and when we cut it shapeshifting m&ms would come out?”

 

“Yes. Exactly.” You agree, rolling your eyes. “We probably shouldn’t have another party. God. Wedding’s so soon, baby.” 

 

“i know.” He grins. “few more weeks. you excited?”

 

“Excited and… stressed, and… I keep doing a mental checklist to make sure we’re all good. We’ve got the space on the mountainside for the reception. Toriel will officiate. We’ve got our invites out, got our bridesmaids and groomsmen… well…”

 

“he wouldn’t miss the wedding. he’ll come back.” Sans says, a little less reassuringly. 

 

“Yeah.” You agree, then suck in a breath. “Then the reception - Tori’s making the cake, Grillbz is catering, we’ve got booze, we’ve got Shyren and Napstablook AND Mettaton for music, Cap’s gonna borrow … I mean… we should check to make sure we can borrow the tents from EbbCo. Just in case.”

 

“ok.” Sans says softly, and then you sigh, curling up against him. 

 

“Shapeshifter.” You murmur after a moment. 

 

“shapeshifter.” He repeats with a soft laugh

 

\--------------------------------

 

You remain there, peacefuly curled up next to him and enjoying the rare privacy, for almost an hour, talking quietly about wedding planning and the baby, until Undyne, softly, sheepishly interrupts, sticking her head around the corner.

 

“So… um.” She begins, and you know from her tone that something ridiculous is about to happen.

 

“...yes?” Sans is skeptical as well - his voice is heavy with trepidation.

 

“So. Um. You know Cody. From work.” She tries again.

 

“Uh, yeah. He’s going to our wedding. We know him. We saved his sister from some spooky bushes together.” You remind her and she grimaces. 

 

“So. I. Got… a weird phone call just now.” She says anxiously. 

 

“From Cody?” You tilt your head. 

 

“Uh, no. From Nat.” Undyne looks even more awkward. “I guess…”

 

“c’mon. spit it out.”

 

“...Cody’s outside the door to Shadow’s apartment?” She says anxiously. “Annnnd…. he’s kinda freaking out?”

 

“Wait, what?” You blink. 

 

“Uh. I dunno, I guess he’s been knocking on the door for like half an hour, and he’s been saying some… not good things, and he won’t answer my calls and Alphys is freaking out-”

 

“is nat at shadow’s?” Sans wants to know.

 

“Yeah. So, uh, can you… make me a shortcut or something?” Undyne twists her hands. She really, really looks nervous, now that you have time to take proper note of this. She looks like…

 

“What are you not telling us?” You say softly.

 

“It’s just that… it would be really bad to have a human attacking a monster right now?” She says, her eye wide. “Like, really bad. Like… really really-”

 

“ok.” Sans decides, cutting her off. “we’ll all go. i’ve dropped shadow off before. i know where he’s at. sides.” He pauses, then grimaces. “we used to be neighbors.” 

 

\----------------------------------------

 

You haven’t been in the monster-only developments for a while, not since you’d determined that it was unacceptable that Sans and Papyrus were living in a place like this and swooped in. After that, you realize guiltily, you’d … well, not forgotten it, but it hadn’t been on your mind. 

 

The apartments might have improved a little, but they’re clearly still slums. There’s a crack running through the drywall in Shadow’s living room, which he’s halfheartedly improved by taping up a poster over the most offending section. The floors, at least, don’t have any pools of standing water, and the door has way, way too many locks - oh, god, poor Shadow - but it feels safer than what Sans and Papyrus had, just a little.

 

Except for the repetitive thud of fists on the door.

 

“You fucking freak, stop touching her. I’m going to fucking kill you.” Cody’s words are loud, but almost dead as they echo into the little hall leading into the apartment. His voice is hoarse, but he shows no sign of relenting. 

 

“how long has this been goin’ on?” Sans asks Nat and Shadow. Shadow’s pacing the length of the apartment, his claws out, tail twitching. Nat’s crumpled up on his futon, both hands buried in her hair as she stares at the door.

 

“An hour.” Shadow spits. “What the fuck is up with this guy?”

 

“I don’t know! This isn’t like him!” Undyne’s freaked. “I talk to him every day!”

 

(“Fucking monster freaks.” The dead voice bellows, and the door shakes with percussive blows.)

 

“He had a little crush on Nat-” You start to remind her, but she shakes her head again. 

 

“He’s not like this!” 

 

“I…” Nat pipes up, then ducks her head. “When we were out earlier, I thought I saw him…” Shadow whirls. 

 

“Why didn’t you say? Where?!” 

 

“By the food court? I don’t know?! I thought-”

 

“He followed us home from the _mall_? That’s a half hour trip!” Shadow snaps. “What the fuck is the matter with this guy?!” 

 

“well.” Sans is deliberately casual. “you’re not goin’ out there bud. lemme take care of this.”

 

“What do you mean take care of this?” You demand, anxious. 

 

“i’m just gonna talk to him.” He tries to sound soothing. “don’t worry. i’ll make him see sense-”

 

He’s interrupted by another shout of “MONSTER SCUM,” which seems to hang in the air as a perfect counterpoint to why he probably shouldn’t do that. 

 

“Nope. No way. I got this one.” You sigh. 

 

“like hell-”

 

“Hey. He’s on some… something’s wrong but I don’t think that inserting a monster into the situation is going to help”

 

“I’m going to insert my foot up his ass.” Shadow growls, and Nat winces. It takes Shadow a second to realize just how freaked out Nat is, but at last, he sits down next to her, curling up protectively, his eyes still on the door.

 

“you’re not going alone.” Sans insists, and you groan. 

 

“Baby. I’ll be on the other side of this door. If anything bad happens, I’ll just…. Pause, okay? And grab you?” Sans blinks at that.

 

“...right. right. that’s an option.” He reminds himself, then grimaces. “i don’t like this.” 

 

“I know. But-”

 

“This can’t end in violence.” Undyne says at once. “I know. Sounds weird coming from me. But trust me. This would be very, very, very bad. Like super bad. Like the worst.” Sans stares at her again, and then says, too casually, 

 

“bud, when this is over, we gotta have a talk. when you say things like that, it gets a little concerning.” Undyne meets his eyes for a second, then ducks her head.

 

“I’m going.” You mutter, and Sans grabs your hand before you can trace the doorway, forcing you to meet his eyes. 

 

“be. safe.” He demands, and you sigh, before leaning down to kiss his forehead. 

 

“I’m a total badass.” You remind him. “I’ll be fine.” His browbones raise skyward, taking in your tacky novelty maternity shirt (it read “ice ice” over your bump, and you were fully non-apologetic for that). You raise your eyebrows back. “I am.” You insist, and before he can protest any further, you draw a doorway to.. well the other side of the door, and you step through. 

 

The walls of the monster development are still that pristine white. All of the rows of apartments gleam from the outside. 

 

The smear of blood on Shadow’s door is jarring.

 

“GIVE HER BACK. FREAK. GIVE HER BACK.” Cody’s voice is raw as he continues to slam his bleeding fist against the door. Immediately, your heart jumps to your throat.

 

“Cody!” You exclaim. 

 

He doesn’t even turn. 

 

“SHE DOESN’T BELONG WITH MONSTER FILTH. SHE’S OURS.” He bellows, and another spray of blood spatters the door as he pulls his hand back. Okay. That’s way too much. 

 

“CODY!” You snap, putting your hand on his shoulder. He whirls, a dumb fury in his eyes, his face contorted, hand still drawn back to strike and you almost pull the trigger, almost pause, but then comprehension dawns in his eyes.

 

“You’re here!” He says. He still hasn’t blinked. “You came! You can save her! Help.” 

 

“Cody, what… what the hell are you talking about, okay, this is really messed-”

 

“He took her, he’s going to hurt her, monsters just hurt people, I’ve got to… I’ve got to…” He says glassily, blinks, and then turns back to the door, raising his hand again. That’s enough.

 

“Hey!” You snap, and he turns again. “Stop it, Cody! This is wrong, okay? This isn’t like you! You love monsters-”

 

“They’re dirty!” He hisses. “I was wrong. He’s… it’s, it’s touching her. It’s _touching_ her! It can’t! I love her!” You blink, inching back a little. Something is terribly, terribly wrong. This isn’t like Cody at all. In fact,

 

“Cody… You met her once. Can you even tell me her last name?” You try to stay calm.

 

“I love… it’s wrong… filth… gotta…” He babbles, eyes growing wider. “Gotta knife. Gotta knife. I’m gonna. Fix. I am going to fix it. Disgusting. I’m gonna…. Look.” Without warning, he reaches in his pocket, smearing blood on his khaki colored pants, and produces a box cutter, extending the blade. “See? See. It’s. I can. I can fix. Help.”

 

“What? Oh god. No. Cody. I’m gonna… I’m gonna call an ambulance or something, something’s wrong.”

 

“Gotta.” He goes on, unperturbed, and moves the box cutter to his left hand before turning back to the door. “Gotta do it. Dirty. I gotta- _help_.” His voice is clearer this time, and you catch it, the variation of emotion there in the otherwise terrifying affect. 

 

“I want to help. Let me help. How can I-”

 

He turns slowly, once more, and now he is truly terrifying. His eyes are wide and he is smiling in bizarre spasms and tears are forming in his big, brown, twitching eyes, his teeth grit, his knuckles white on the handle of the box cutter.

 

“It’s. Wrong. **HELP.** ” He forces through clenched teeth, sounding desperate, sounding choked, and you take a breath, trying to understand, and then - oh, fuck, and then you reach out, helpless, hoping to take the knife from him, to do SOMETHING, and his eyes fall on your arm and suddenly the spasming of his facial muscles stops, and he is calm and cool and collected as he mutters;

 

“Oh. Right. You’re one of them.” 

 

He doesn’t hesitate for an instant. 

 

The blade gleams as he lunges for your throat.


	149. Wherein You Die For Real

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [I'm still David S. Pumpkins](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Human skin is not as thick as a box, which is to say, that you don’t stand a single fucking chance against the box cutter. 

 

Cody’s strong and athletic and quick and absolutely unreadable - he doesn’t even have a show, it’s just a switch being flipped and the box cutter arcs through the air and the blade slides neatly, gracefully into your throat, before you can move or Pause or anything. It’s just like that. One minute you’re standing there, trying to figure out why this is happening, and then a moment later you’re watching, as if in slow motion, the arterial spray, individual crimson droplets - oh, fuck, that’s cliche, you’re going to die in the most hackneyed way - creeping through the air to splash against Cody, and the bloody door, and the white clapboard of the outside of Shadow’s apartment, and 

 

the baby

 

and

 

….

 

Wait. 

 

No?

 

That hadn’t happened at all, you’re standing there on Shadow’s stoop and Cody has JUST seen your arm, his expression flickering, and then you’re getting tugged backwards through a doorway and -

 

You’re back inside Shadow’s apartment, and Sans has your shoulders, turning you around, gasping and wild eyed, and you raise your fingers tentatively to your throat just as he nearly screams-

 

“you promised you were gonna pause!”

 

“I didn’t have time!” You mutter, your brows knitting… this isn’t making sense, and it feels like everything is sliding away, making less and less and less sense, and already you’re not sure why Sans is looking so upset, why you keep touching your neck, which is - it is smooth and unhurt and just like it usually is. “Did something-”

 

You’re cut off as he crushes his lips to yours, holding you as tight as he’d ever held you, and you try to cling to something that’s already slipped almost entirely away.

 

“What…” Undyne is saying, shifting anxiously, and Sans pulls away to look at you, just taking you in for a second before he turns to look at Undyne, Nat and Shadow, cringing slightly at the sound of fists on the door once more. 

 

“i gotta few seconds leeway in the when i make a doorway.” He rasps.”thank fuck.”

 

“Oh. OH. Sans, did I-” Had you…. you couldn’t have died, right? Surely you would remember… but Sans seemed to be the only one who did remember, those sliding trips through time. He was the only constant as reality warped around him, and- “I died? I mean I-”

 

“shh. s’ok.” He mutters, pressing his face to your neck and lingering - he’s shaking. “we… we gotta call the cops or something-”

 

“Sans. Something’s not right with him-”

 

“he kill- he tried, he tried-”

 

“I know. I know. But… that’s not Cody. I know him. He doesn’t hate monsters. He never seemed anything like this. Something’s up. We … this doesn’t seem like a human thing. I don’t know if he got like, drugged, or brainwashed, or.. I don’t know. I don’t know. But this isn’t right. I think he needs our help.”

 

“Are you feeling _sorry_ for him!?” Shadow snarls, while Nat simultaneously repeats,

 

“...You died?” 

 

“it’s ok. it’s ok.” Sans is still clutching you so tight you can barely breathe. Oh, god, all you want to do is stop this, to comfort him, to give him time, but...

 

“It won’t be if we let this go on. We need to get him somewhere safe where he can’t hurt himself or anyone else and figure this out.” You mutter, and Undyne swallows, shuffling her feet.

 

“...I know nobody wants to say it right now.” She whispers. “I know. But there’s a solution to this problem.”

 

“don’t.” Sans mutters, but Undyne looks squarely at him. 

 

“He’s got the safest place for Cody to be right now. And… I trust him. He was like a dad to me growing up. I just need to talk to him. Just let me do the talking. I’m great at talking.”

 

Nobody seems particularly willing to challenge that assertion, but glances are exchanged. 

 

“He has that cell. Where Gaster was.” You finally admit. “Maybe for now… Just until we can find out how to help him.”

 

“don’t we know anyone else with a cell?!” Sans says desperately. You grit your teeth, then shake your head.

 

“Babe. You know The Thing we’ve been waiting for? I hate to say it, but this is feeling like some... “ You trail off, pressing your fingers hard to your neck once more, almost feeling a razor’s edge sliding through that intricate network that kept you alive. 

 

You and Dot had nearly... 

 

Cody wouldn’t do that. Cody was the kind of guy that showed up after hours to make sure that everyone’s work got done, that all the animals were happy. He was the kind of guy that had to be held back from hurting his MIB neighbors next door. 

 

There’s another wet sounding thump, a dull bellow of rage.

 

“This is feeling like some magic bullshit.” You finally mutter. Sans hesitates, looking around the room again, then gulps and nods.

 

“asgore’s, then.”

 

“The Palace.” You agree.

 

\------------------------------------------------

 

Getting Cody to the cell is simple, when it comes down to it. Sans is better at making doorways than you are, and he doesn’t need to see the side of the door to know what he’s doing; he just waits for another thump on the door, another scream of impotent fury, and then he cuts, with surgical precision, the ground out from under Cody’s feet. 

 

He’ll have some bumps and bruises, but he’ll be fine, you rationalize, thinking of Portal, hoping he didn’t flop into the cell with too much velocity.

 

“Is he-”

 

“he’s fine.” Sans assures you, though there’s a hard glint in his eyes you don’t love. Maybe he hadn’t given Cody the easiest treatment. Then again, he’d watched the man kill you…

 

You let it slide.

 

Undyne looks at Shadow and Nat. “You’d better come with. He’ll want to speak to you.” She mutters.

 

“Oh. I am not dressed to meet a king.” Nat sounds like she’s still in shock.

 

“It’s okay.” Shadow’s calmed down considerably, now that the hammering on the door has stopped. “He’s nice. He likes everyone.” 

 

“Almost everyone.” Undyne says pointedly, and glances at you and Sans just long enough that you take her meaning. 

 

“We’ll let you talk. We’ll hang outside. But...Undyne, what are you going to say?!” 

 

“As little as possible. Just enough to let him know that this is an _isolated incident that was taken care of._ ” She hisses through her teeth. 

 

“undyne. pal. buddy. what’s going on.” Sans demands. “why are you so worried about that? please. you gotta-”

 

“When we get to the palace, talk to Gerson.” She says. “I’m not sure… I think I have the whole story, but… talk to Gerson. He likes you.”

 

“the ol’timer?” Sans looks surprised, peering up at Undyne - his grip on your hand is still so tight it’s beginning to hurt, but you can’t complain, not right now. 

 

“Yes.” She says shortly, then sucks in a breath. “Look. We gotta go before anyone starts wondering about the human in the cell.” 

 

She’s not wrong. Still shaking slightly, Sans traces one more doorway, into the palace entrance hall.

 

\-----------------------------------

 

It takes some time to get past the guards, to get Asgore’s attention, but eventually you all are permitted entrance. This is beginning to feel like something of an old game at this point; although, while everyone else is heading off into the throne room, you and Sans peel off as Sans spots a palace runner. 

 

“hey. kid. where can i find gerson?” He demands. The young rabbit monster stammers and blushes for a moment, wiping their paws on the plush front of their uniform. 

 

“Um. M-Mister Gerson is usually with um… Dr. Gaster. Inthelab.” They mutter, and Sans’ eyes widen. 

 

“fine. fuck. fine.” He whispers, and looks at you for a second, suddenly clearly reluctant to walk any further into the jaws of danger with you at his side.

 

“Sans.” You begin, then pause, trying to figure out the right words. “It’s okay. We’ll stick together. We’ll be safe.” 

 

“...fine.” He mutters again, and squeezes your hand once more before releasing it at last. The two of you walk silently, up staircase after climbing staircase until you pause before a most familiar door. You’d been to Gaster’s lab before, of course, but last time it had been calm and mostly unmoving. Now, you can hear the whir of machinery, practically feel the hum of electricity and magic and… 

 

There are voices on the other side of the door. 

 

Sans doesn’t hesitate any longer; he throws the double doors to the lab open to reveal a room that is hot and noisy and crowded with technology that, at your first glance, means absolutely nothing to you. In the center of the room, Gaster and a wizened old turtle monster that you’ve seen once before are hunched over a pile of documents on a table, clearly in heated debate. They both look up at once as the doors open, looking almost exactly like children who have been caught with their hands in the cookie jar.

 

Gaster recovers first. 

 

“Ah. Sans. ________. I did not expect…. oh dear, is all well? You both look-”

 

“it has been. a tough. day.” Sans snarls, and then looks around the room again. “what’s all this? there’s a lot more gear in here than there was last time.”

 

Again, there is an awkward pause that settles over the room. The turtle - Gerson - clears his throat dryly. 

 

“Son, I think-k-k perhaps we should ask King Asgore-”

 

“no.” Sans’ tone is deadly. “i watched my fiancee nearly die today. i don’t know anything that’s going on here, but undyne seems to think that one of you have the answers to some of my questions, so you’re going to start talking, or i swear to god, i will do terrible things.” It’s not much of a threat, but the tone of his voice chills you to the bone. He’s serious. Right now, you don’t know if there’s a thing that Sans wouldn’t do to keep you safe. “what are you doing here?” He repeats, the false calm in his voice unsettling now. 

 

“Well. Goodness-s. Nothing that would possibly have caused any harm to your fiancee.” Gaster says diplomatically. Gerson watches him with keen, if cloudy, eyes, then snorts. 

 

“That’s not entirely true, is it?” He says dryly. Gaster looks outraged at the other monster. 

 

“How could-d you insinuate-”

 

“Tell ‘em the truth, Gast. Tell ‘em what we’ve been doing here.”

 

“It’s nothing harmful!” Gaster exclaims again. “In fact, it is the exact opposite. The king requested we find a method of non-violent defense, if the humans do ever choose to attack again, and we have v-v-v-v-v-v-very nearly completed it!” 

 

Sans eyes narrow. “whattya mean, non-violent?” He says, sidling up to the blueprints on the table. Gaster instinctively moves to yank them away, but Gerson plops a meaty hand down on the paper, keeping it in place. “this is the whole town. is this… this looks like a field effect map. like a dome. or... fuck. what-”

 

“In the case of another mass human attack-k-k, Dr. Alphys and myself were asked by the king to find a method of… crowd suppression.” Gaster says, darting a glance at you. 

 

“Don’t be flowery, boy.” Gerson snaps. “I might not understand all your wires and bells and whistles and techno-mumbo-jumbo, but that’s not what I’m here for.” He looks up, locking eyes with you. “They came up with a button. A button attached to a ray. You press it once, and every human in Ebott Township falls asleep. That’s their ‘crowd suppression’.” He says this like it should be a really distressing revelation, but you just feel bewildered. This doesn’t sound like an issue! This sounds like the solution you’d been hoping for, just in case it happened again!

 

“...I’m not getting this.” You admit, speaking up at once. “That sounds.. honestly, like kind of a good idea? If there’s another mass attack, I wouldn’t mind going to sleep if it meant that the monsters were all safe.” Sans looks up at you, his face perfectly composed, but you know him well enough to know the similar confusion that must be whirling in his head.

 

“wait. what about like… the humans in cars? or using dangerous machines? or in surgery?” He says, after a second. Gerson nods grimly.

 

“We b-beleive that the spell is sufficiently tailored in order to ensure that the humans reach a point of safety-”

 

“Bullhucky!” Gerson roars, shouting over Gaster. “You know it isn’t safe, boy. Tell ‘em.” 

 

Gaster hesitates, steepling his long, bony fingers, but remains silent. 

 

“Fine. Typical.” Gerson looks between you and Sans, his rheumy eyes wide. “D’ya know what I was, in a past life? Well, not you, human, but you, boneboy?” 

 

“...uh.” Sans is clearly just as off kilter as you. “i know you’ve been around as long as anyone. that you knew asgore from the war-”

 

“Knew ‘em?!” Gerson sprays spittle as he raises himself up to his full cumbersome height. “I fought at his side! I was his general! D’you know what I did? What my magic allows me to do?”

 

Sans stares blankly at Gerson, then shakes his head once, a tiny “no”. Gerson sighs, then nods as if he’d been expecting this and is only a little disappointed. 

 

“I can tell the odds of a thing coming to be.” He says dryly. “I knew when that little pipsqueak fell down, that there was only a sliver of a chance that they’d free us. Bet on ‘em anyway. I know it won’t rain tomorrow. I know that the odds are great that that baby in your belly will be strong and healthy and happy, so long as you survive long enough to have it-”

 

“wait, what?” Sans is clearly distracted by this point. 

 

“-and I know one thing for certain. As things stand, if that button ever gets pressed, if the humans in this town are all put to sleep?” He takes a breath. “How many people live in Ebbot?”

 

“Uh… I don’t know, I’m sorry? It’s probably a few hundred thousand. Maybe two hundred and fifty thousand?”

 

“And what’s one percent of that?” Gerson asks patiently. 

 

“two thousand five hundred.” Sans says at once. Normally, you’d have called him a nerd, but...

 

“That button gets pressed, and two thousand five hundred humans will fall asleep, and they will _never wake back up_.” Gerson snaps. Gaster, behind him, groans, burying his face in his hands. 

 

“F-for the greater good-”

 

“The greater good?!” Gerson growls. “Those are lives! Those are people! If we’re trying to live up here in harmony, we can’t commit …” He trails off, and studies you. “Boy.” He suddenly barks, looking at Gaster. “You fool. If you think this is a justified risk… will you be satisfied when she doesn’t wake up?”

 

“wait. what?!” Sans is fully panicked now, his eyes glinting and ribs rising and falling in the way that means genuine distress.

 

“Wait. If that spell is deployed… I wouldn’t…” You begin, and Gerson glowers at Gaster. 

 

“Odds aren’t looking so good.” He rasps.


	150. Wherein You Fall Asleep And Never Wake Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [ANY QUESTIOOOOOOONNNNNNS????](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“wait. wait. what does that mean? why wouldn’t she-”

“Can’t tell.” Gerson grumbles, and taps the side of his head. “Cloudy. I never could get the whys, just the probabilities.”

“The probability you have calculated is that a small percentage of humans would not wake up, based on the technology that we have developed so far-r.” Gaster says, clipped and irritated. “You should know better-r than anyone, old friend, that time is … fluid-d-d-”

“Stop it. The way you talk about time is damn unsettling, boy.” Gerson growls. “And if we were gonna find a way to wake ‘em back up, that whippersnapper Alpho woulda done it by now.” 

“Alphys.” You correct reflexively, feeling numb, then blink. “Oh. God. Her project. It was-”

“i’m gonna kill her.” Sans growls.

“No you’re not.” You hush quietly, then look at Gerson. “The king. Is he going to-”

“He says he won’t. But this damn fool keeps tryin’ to tweak it, when he should be tearin’ the damn thing down!” Gerson bellows.

“I am attempt-t-t-ting to correct the structural flaw!” Gaster snarls back. “I of course would not do anything to harm my son’s fiancee or my grandchild!”

Sans pauses, locking eyes with his father, then lets out a weary, absolutely humorless burst of laughter.

“right dad. of course not.” He finally says, his voice as dry as you’ve ever heard it. 

“Sans. _________. You must understand-d-d! If I can only get this right, if I can only figure out the flaw… this could save so many lives! This could bring peace!” Sans just stares dully at his father, and to your surprise, you hear yourself speak up. 

“Uh. Can you fucking… just… NOT?” You say, striding forward. Sans darts a glance at you, notes the absolute fury in your gaze, and keeps himself stuck right to your side, just in case you do something really dumb. “I mean, look! You’ve made this mistake before! Why the hell would you do something like this again?!” You say, really working yourself up now. “There are _limits_ to what a decent person does. They don’t make a device that could… christ, that could kill me!” You’re channeling something that has been sitting inside of you for a long time, that rarely gets used, that righteously furious little voice that sounds, truth be told, a hell of a lot like Capra. “Just… quit it! Just fucking quit it with this sci-fi horror bullshit! I mean, are you even listening to yourself? You sound like a bad guy from a movie!”

“No!” He sounds pained. “I am-m not t-trying to harm… this is p-penance-”

“Penance to who?” You say, stepping closer still. You’re right up in his face, now, and he’s inching back slightly, looking very alarmed. In your peripheral vision, you can see Sans, who looks like he’s not sure if he’s going to be sick or kiss you, and Gerson, who looks…. well, Gerson looks like he’s suddenly having a very good time. “To the king? You don’t owe the king _shit_. You. Owe. Me.” Gaster’s eyes widen as you step even closer - he’s backed up against the table with the blueprints, and there’s nowhere left for him to go.

“I-I-I know, I d-d-d-”

“You tried to kill me.” You reel off. “You tried to kill your son. God knows what you would have done next. And buddy? I saved your life.”

“Wh-”

“I took your magic. I took all of it. I think I could have taken more than that.” You barely recognize the voice coming out of your mouth, but you are just _done_. You died today. Your child had almost certainly died too. And now with this… “I could have stripped you down to nothing. There would have been nothing of you left. Not even Dust.” You whisper. 

You’re not entirely sure if this is true, of course, but it’s having the desired effect. Gaster looks more than alarmed. He looks like this is the very last place he would ever want to be.

“I. I. I.” This isn’t clicking, this isn’t his tic. He’s stammering.

“You. Owe. Me.” You breathe again, and then, when he doesn’t move, you snap and grab his hand. He doesn’t put up a fight, just stares down at you - god, he still dwarfs you, but right now he’s looking particularly intimidated. You don’t hesitate, barely even think about it, you just force his hand to rest on top of your belly, right above that little, always growing green soul. “This is your grandkid.” You say, almost calmly. “Like it or not, this kid is partially your responsibility.” Your eyes narrow. “You liked that, sitting out there in time, didn’t you? Seeing your legacy? All those people you helped into being? You liked it enough to try to tear me wide open, just because I changed up the lives you thought you got to claim as yours. Welp. This kid is here. Are you gonna let someone kill me? Kill them?”

“It’s-s-s-s not a death sentence-”

“ _Never waking up?_ ” You hiss, still holding his hand firmly against your stomach, forcing him to confront this. “It’s _worse_. So. Are you really going to push for this? Is that really, _really_ what you want to do? Because Gaster.” You pause, studying his face. “We’ll push back.” You mutter.

And inside your womb, someone very small, someone very changeable, someone who barely exists and yet already loves their mother very much, that someone rearranges their shape so they can find the power for one hard kick, weeks before they should be able to do so. 

It’s too much for Gaster. He snatches his hand away like it’s burnt, and then glances away from you, his eyes downcast. Sans senses his opportunity. 

“how long will it take to break this down?”

“...Days. No. To be safe… weeks. To prevent any accidental discharge of the stored poten-n-ntial energy-”

“well.” Sans breathes. “you’d better get crackin’, huh?” 

Gaster looks back at you, then at Sans, then Gerson (who seems to be practically bathing in vindictive glee at this point). 

“...I suppose I had better.” He finally agrees, gazing around the room, his eyes wide as the enormity of the task settles upon him. 

\----------------------------------------------------------

“I-I-I-I’m so s-s-s-ssorry-”

Alphys is practically unintelligible through her sniffling and tears.

“good.” Sans isn’t having it. You glare at him, and then when his expression remains unchanged, swat his arm. “i’m not sorry.” He mutters.

“She was trying to do something good!” You insist. You can insist something like that now, when you’re home, safe, in the living room, far away from Gaster or Asgore or anyone who might misinterpret.

“I w-w-w-was…. I t-t-thought…” Alphys begins again, and you sigh, moving over to her side. Undyne is at Nat and Shadow’s, helping them clean up. The talk with Asgore had gone… fine, apparently. The king had been slightly alarmed, but willing to chalk this up to some sort of mental break, and he was now working with the human authorities to find the safest place for Cody to be at the moment, for his own good. His mother and sister were probably going to be heartbroken, you thought, absently pulling Alphys into a hug and stroking her back. She continues to sniffle but lets you hold her, leaving a big, wet, teary spot on the front of your shirt as she wails. Sans opens his mouth to say something, but when you glare at him, he backs down, and you just let Alphys cry for a while, still stroking her back. 

“I s-s-stopped.” She finally whispers. “Once I r-realized… I asked Asgore and he l-let me stop working on it. I d-didn’t know… I d-didn’t think that he’d ask G-gaster to…” She trails off, wiping her eyes. “I’m so sorry.” 

“It wasn’t your fault.” You whisper reassuringly. 

“I w-wanted to tell you… it’s b-been so awful, k-keeping quiet-”

“s’ok, alph.” Sans sighs. “i probably woulda done the same. it was a good idea, just-”

“I s-still can’t f-figure out where I went w-wrong.” She says tearily, then sniffles. “I’m s-s-sorry-”

“Shhh…” You reassure her. “It’s okay. It’s gonna be fine. Gaster started taking the machine down already, and Gerson said he’d keep an eye on it, make sure that everything’s fine.”

“T-thank god.” She says, sounding miserable and exhausted, then looks up at the sound of a door slamming. “T-that’s Undyne.”

“Go talk to her.” You urge. ‘Let her know it’s over. It’s gonna be fine.”

“Y-yeah?” 

“Yeah.” You promise, and give her a little extra squeeze before letting her stand up. She glances over her shoulder at you twice, on the way out, but eventually she does leave, leaving just you and Sans in the room by yourselves. You begin to get back up to your feet with a groan, but he stops you, holding up a hand and getting up himself, moving to your side. 

“fuck.” He finally sighs.

“...Yeah.” You find his hand, letting your head droop onto his shoulder. You feel exhausted. Totally wrung out. But - oh right: “Dot kicked.” 

“what?!” 

“When I was doing that weird thing. Dot kicked. I felt it. So did Gaster.”

“dot’s not big enough to kick.” He says, then snorts. “well. suppose size is probably relative.” He processes this for a second. “dot kicked.” He repeats. 

“Yup.”

“and my asshole dad got to feel it and not me.” He drawls, and you sigh, laughing a little. 

“Sorry, babe. I think you’ll have plenty of chances in the future.”

“i’d better.” He mutters, wrapping an arm around you and holding you very close. “i almost… you almost…”

“I didn’t.” You breathe, and he sighs.

“‘nother thing for the nightmare pile, though.” 

“Mmm. I’m sorry.”

“s’ok. not your fault. dunno who’s fault it is, but…” 

He trails off for a while, just holding you. After a few minutes, his other hand moves to your belly - just in case, you think, Dot decides to kick again. They don’t, but this is… necessary. You really, desperately need this. After some time passes, your limbs begin to feel like lead, your eyelids drooping. You’ve been through a lot today. So has he.

You’re almost asleep when he finishes his thought.

“whoever made this happen… i’m gonna make damn sure, before too long...” He pauses again, swallows, then says with considerably more determination; 

“ **they’re gonna burn in hell.** ”


	151. Wherein It's A Real Depressing One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, I'm sure you're totally unsurprised to hear that the election results really threw off my writing, as it hurt and disrupted many, many other people. I'm upset and I'm worried, but I am here for you kids, however an author of a skeleton dick fanfic can be. If you feel alone or afraid or threatened or hurting, know that you're not alone. I'm right there with you, and I love you, and I will be fighting to keep you safe regardless of your gender or the color of your skin or your sexual or gender orientation. You're not alone. I'm here with you and I will fight for you and I will care for you, and I will love you, no matter what. 
> 
> And if this statement upsets you and you think that it's needlessly political, boy fucking howdy have you been reading the wrong story, because we here in Chill or Be Chilled Industries, Inc. believe in love, not hate, we believe in unity, not fear, and we believe in the power of people coming together to form something greater. And you know what? No fucking pundits, no fucking vote, no fucking president can take that away from us. We're here to do good and love each other, motherfuckers. Get on board or hit the goddamn road. 
> 
> [hell yeah](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Sans’ grand plan to get someone burning in hell has to be put on the backburner, because, well, it’s two weeks until the wedding, rapidly becoming one week until the wedding, and suddenly shit has gotten serious.

There had been things that you had been putting off - dozens of things, really, like making sure Asgore has enough chairs, or asking Aaron and Tommy how they’d gotten their marriage license, or attempting to convince Papyrus that Ghost does not strictly need to attend the wedding, and even if he does, he doesn’t need his own tux. 

This last one is a bit of a failure, as it turns out. Papyrus has gifts. Weird gifts. Kitty formalwear seems to be one of them. Weirder still, Ghost is totally pliable and complacent with all of this; Papyrus demonstrates, walking around in big circles, making an absolutely ridiculous amount of noise, a very fancy, very old cat perched on his shoulder, until you finally slump. 

“Fine.” You sigh. “Ghost can be in the wedding.”

“YIPPEE!” Papyrus crows. “YOU WON’T REGRET IT! WE’LL BOTH MAKE YOU PROUD!”

“d’you think shadow will be insulted?” Sans mutters from his spot at your elbow. He has been…. basically inseparable from you, this past week. You’d had times on your own, of course - you’d had work, as had he, but it was rare for twenty minutes to go by without your phone buzzing. He was anxious, still. He’d show it in the obvious way, but also in little ones - you didn’t think your neck had ever been kissed so often. Still, right now, knowing just how close you’d come to dying, you really don’t mind. You kinda need him around, after all. 

“I think Shadow will tolerate it politely.” You sigh, watching Papyrus’ gleeful victory lap around the house, Ghost holding on as if this was the sort of thing he did every day. Well, maybe he did do this every day. You’d always kind of wondered what those two and L.D. got up to when you were gone. Speaking of which, there was another pet to be considered. “Hey, is Spot gonna be in the wedding?”

“ha, ok?” Sans looks entertained. “blaster at our wedding. cool. i wouldn’t wanna leave her home or in the void, anyway. besides, if there’s any troub-”

“Don’t. Jinx it.” You interrupt, narrowing your eyes at him, then sigh, looking out over the back yard. The days were getting shorter, and the turning leaves were rapidly on their way to spectacular. Next weekend was forecast to be beautiful. “I should make sure she understands how to behave, though.” 

“she’s smart.” Sans says with a shrug.

“Yeah, but not great with new humans. Remember how she was with Capra, first time?” You point out. He raises his browbones. 

“‘s not a bad thing. if any more of our friends go nuts on us-”

“Sans.” You sigh, then try to think of something else, moving unconsciously to find his hand. “Any word about how Cody’s doing?” 

“screamin’ less, i heard. might even be sleeping, according to gerson.” Sans had been in touch with Gerson, not trusting his father to give accurate updates on the progress of the machine’s destruction. You suspect that he and Gerson had rather been enjoying each other’s company. Maybe… maybe Gerson could step in for Cap for Sans’ bachelor party? But… oh, god, you couldn’t think about that, your stomach just twisted with worry. He was still gone. Cap was still gone, and there was a speck, out on the beach, a shiny distant robot staring out over the choppy waters, and… oh, god, that was too sad. You couldn’t. 

“Screaming less is good.” You say numbly. “His mom?”

“came to visit every day. she’s upset, but she agrees something’s wrong. cody’s not like this. if he calms down enough that he won’t be a risk, she wants to get him transferred to a human hospital, but she’s glad they’re keeping him safe. tori’s been doing a lot of diplomatic work with her.”

“Mmm, no kidding.” You say with a shiver. “If I were her, if my kid were locked up… well…” You sigh, looking down at your stomach, then back up at Sans. “I’d want to save them. Find out who had done something to make them act like that.”

“yeah.” Sans says quietly, looking you over. “not that our kid is gonna ever be a deranged murderer obsessed with nat.”

“Hey, you don’t know what’s coming!” You laugh, teasing him, then sigh at the look on his face. “Yeah. Our kid will probably be very well behaved-”

He snorts. 

“Fine.” You try again. “Our kid will be clever and interesting and street smart enough not to get lured into whatever bullshit Cody’s mixed up in.” 

“god, i hope so.” Sans mutters, resting his head on your shoulder.

“Yeah…” You breathe, staring out at Mettaton on the beach, and feeling just… sad and tired. 

“AHHHHHHHHH” Papyrus interjects, in the middle of another victory lap, not really shouting about anything, just… shouting. 

“ahhhh.” Sans agrees halfheartedly, then looks up at you once Papyrus makes it to the sideyard. “well. you gonna talk to spot?”

“Yeah, lemme just find her. She actually wanted to go back into the void this morning, she kept nudging me until I cut the door back there big enough for her to get through. 

“huh.” Sans says, brow furrowing. “weird.” 

“Yeah.” You agree, then reach out, tracing a doorway in that particularly careful method, pulling the layers of reality away from each other to reveal the yawning, churning hole of the Void. All of those swirling colors and strange geometries in there, they still make you feel kind of sick after all this time. They’re just… not right. Not a place humans should be seeing, you think, reaching out with your mind for that familiar trilling note of Spot’s enthusiasm. 

It takes her a while to respond, long enough that you actually start to get a little nervous. She’s usually bounding out the door the second that she hears you open it up, but she’s been acting strange all day; indeed, she floats out slowly, the lights in her massive eyes rolling back to the void several times - when you go to seal up most of the doorway, she huffs, letting out a splitting negative emotion in your head, a shout that is almost the word “no!” You wince and put your hand back down, then absently reach up to touch your temple as Sans says, indignantly, 

“hey! be good!” 

Spot rolls an eye at him, then hovers over, a massive wall of bone, turning sideways to examine you properly. This is.. yeah. Still weird. 

“Spot, sweetie, what the hell is going on?” You ask, reaching out to scratch the ridge of bone under her eye. She lets out a soft grumble, that groan of content, but then edges away from you, turning to face you head on.

“this is weird.” Sans protests, inching up closer to you. “she’s not usually like this. what if this is like a cody thing? what if-”

The grumble that Spot lets out at him sounds particularly dismissive. She hesitates, hovering in the air, and then a soft, quizzical feeling crosses your head. Spot is trying to ask something, you just can’t… it’s so hard to understand without words! She realizes this, and very, very gently, she floats closer, until her snout is almost touching you, just a few centimeters away..

She makes that questioning trill again, and nudges your belly. 

“OH!” You exclaim, then you can’t help it, you laugh, because how do you possibly explain to your giant bone-puppy, your favorite astral abomination, that you were... with child? “That’s, uh, that’s our baby, Spot. Can you see their… I don’t know if you can see souls, I don’t, I assume, I….” You blink, trying to think. Spot is still looking inquisitively at you, and lets off another chirp in your head. “Oh, jeez. Um, a little one. Like… like how Frisk is little, but this is mine and Sans’ and…. and okay, you’re going back to the void now…” You say, trailing off.

“she’s being weird.” Sans complains again, watching as Spot slides back through into the churning mess of colors and shapes that constitutes the void. “i dunno, babe. this is strange, she-”

“She’s coming back.” You say, cutting him off before he can… oh, what, hurt Spot’s feelings? She is returning, though, sliding through curtains of indescribable color on the other side of the void, and-

“she’s got somethin’ in her mouth.” Sans notices.

“Oh god, I hope it’s not the void equivalent of a dead bird. She’s the only one that doesn’t bring me dead birds, I swear to god, between Ghost and, and, I don’t even want to KNOW what L.D. has going on in the poolhouse, I haven’t been in there in two months, I’m honestly terrified-”

Spot cuts you off with a groan, somewhere between disapproval and amusement, and the _something_ in her mouth moves slightly. 

“might be a dead bird.” Sans says dryly as Spot hovers back over, and you groan. It doesn’t look like a bird, it looks small and round and almost the exact same color as Spot, just a little lighter, held so delicately between her front teeth. 

“It isn’t.” You sigh. “What is it, though, girl? What did you want to - hoo, okay - “ Spot doesn’t ask your permission or hesitate any longer, she just gets right up in your grill and opens her mouth, and the tiny white object drops. You instinctively lunge out to grab it with both arms, but there’s no need; it stops its fall, and hovers midair, and suddenly - OH. OH. You get it!

“it’s… a tiny blaster?” Sans says, mystified. 

“It’s a _baby_.” You correct, looking in awe at the little skull - god, they started SO little, this was barely the size of a balloon, with big, big eye sockets and, hell, growth plates, it had so much growing to do! “Spot! Is this your baby?” 

Obvious confusion spills into your brain, and Spot lets out a whine. 

“don’t think they have - i mean, they must, but - they… huh. not yours, huh girl?” Sans says. 

Agreement, from Spot. 

“it’s okay for you to bring it to show us, though?”

Vehement agreement. 

“It’s beautiful?” You say, reaching tentatively out to stroke the tiny, bobbing blaster’s head; the little thing is still examining you with intense scrutiny. “But… Spot, sweetheart, why did you bring us-” 

The tiny blaster lets out its own, inquisitive trill, leaning close to you, and - 

Oh, all of a sudden there is a flurry of activity inside you, as _somebody_ reacts. You immediately grab your belly, and Sans jerks closer, alarmed. You shake your head at once;

“It’s okay! It’s okay.” You reassure him, trying not to giggle at the sensation of little limbs, “Quick, feel!” He hesitates only a second longer, then reaches out, touching your stomach, his eyes wide. Even through your t-shirt, he must be able to feel Dot’s excited shifting, because he mutters;

“holy shit.” 

“Yeah!” You laugh, and for a second, you’re just pleased that he gets this moment, before everything suddenly clicks, as the tiny blaster nuzzles against you, and Spot lets out a satisfied huff, suddenly pressing in on your other side. “Oh…. oh, god, Spot, you are… you are such a good girl…” You murmur numbly, reaching out to scratch her nose.

“what… babe, what’s even happening, i am so lost right now…” Sans says, though his eyes are still bright with wonder as Dot gives one last kick or two.

“Spot found our baby a friend.” You murmur. “Someone for them to grow up with, and keep ‘em safe…”

“....ohhhhh.” The enormity of this gift dawns on Sans slowly. “oh, you are a very good girl.” He decides, suddenly in total agreement.

You remain in this strange tableau, all pressed together, a human, a tiny skull, an enormous one and a skeleton, for another minute longer, and then Spot huffs reluctantly, and peels away from you, hovering over to neatly - oh, so gently - pluck the tiny skull out of the air again, heading back to the void. 

“Oh.” Disappointment suddenly strikes you. “You can’t stay?”

Reluctance. Somber agreement. 

“i think…” Sans posits slowly. “to grow, they must need to be in the void. that’s their home.”

Even more somber agreement. 

“Oh.” Again, you’re flooded with disappointment. You liked having Spot around! “And you need to stay with the little guy, keep them safe, I’m guessing.”

The saddest, most reluctant trill confirms that this is the case. 

“just for a while, though, right?” Sans says. This perks Spot up slightly, as she hurries the baby back into the void. Yes. Just for a while. 

Before she can cross the border and fade back into those sickening colors, you lunge forward, sprinting over to hug as much of her as you can manage. 

“You’re a good girl. We’ll check in?” You whisper, and she huffs. “Okay. Okay. I know you want to get that little guy back. Be a good girl.” You murmur, and kiss the closest part of shiny white bone you can reach. 

Spot gives you one last stab of pure affection, and then she slides with her tiny charge into the incomprehensible whirl of the void. Reluctantly, you reach up, once you can’t make sense of where she is any longer, and you close the door, feeling a bizarre mix of grateful and suddenly defenseless. 

“that.” Sans says quietly, staring at the space where the portal had been just seconds ago. “that is a good dog.”


	152. Wherein Shit's About To Hit The Fan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [No Trump, No KKK, No Fascist USA](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [ See you at stream!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“rowdy.” 

“What? Why?!” 

“s’a good name for a dog!” 

“Oh, thank god, that one was for the blaster.”

The name conversation has been getting confusing in its third or fourth hour. 

It’s one thing to come up with a name for a baby, but a baby and a puppy was a lot. Like, a lot, a lot. And it turned out that you and Sans had very different ideas about what kids got named.

“wilbur.” He suggests, and you snort.

“Baby or blaster?”

“uh, either? it’s a good name! that pig has it.”

“Maybe blaster, not baby.” You sigh. “I can only imagine what the kids at school would say to a half-human, half-monster kid named Wilbur.”

“you know, eventually you’re gonna have to come up with _some_ kinda name. s’not like we can call them dot forever.” 

“I know. I know. I’m working on it.” You rub your stomach absently, and stare out the window of the family room, watching the weather anxiously. “Oh, god, Sans, I hope this doesn’t knock all the leaves off the trees, they just need to make it one more week…” 

The afternoon had been bright and warm and sunny, but a few hours after Spot had taken her tiny ward back into the void, some new weather system had blown in, and the clear day had abruptly been replaced with a tumultuous downpour so heavy that there were already tiny ponds forming in your backyard as the grass was soaked. Worse, it was _cold!_ You had been reluctant to admit that shorts season was officially over, but once Sans had noticed the goosebumps on your arms and legs, he’d had none of that, and had basically frogmarched you upstairs to get changed. So now, here you were, in sweatpants, fluffy slippers, and a totally stolen fur lined hoodie, chilling out next to the fireplace and bickering about names as the rain pounded down. 

“‘s not gonna ruin the photos.” He says tolerantly, checking out the window himself. “trees have barely started turning colors here.”

“Yeah, but the weather app says that it’s gonna sleet. Sleet could take down the leaves. Maybe even our power.” 

“ohhh…” He says, then sighs. “i hate the first snow. a little. hope it doesn’t get too gross out there.” You nod, thinking of his home in Snowden, then lean in to kiss one of the vertebrae of his neck. 

“Don’t get too bummed out, bonehead. Snow is just… you know. It’s change.” You murmur. “Up here, things change.”

“heh. tell me about it.” He laughs, a hand warmed by the fire sneaking under your (well, his) hoodie to rest on the skin of your stomach. “lotsa changes.” 

“Metric fuckloads.” You agree, and he snorts. 

“you sound like capra.” 

“Well, I _did_ eat his soul, maybe he’s finally rubbing off on-”

“gah! don’t!” He says, fully indignant, and you snicker, especially when he makes a show of examining your soul for any sign of metallic purple. No such luck - or er, unluck, as the case may be: it’s still the same flickering outside, with that tiny, twisting core of black. “seriously. that’s my literal nightmare.” He grumbles, and you snicker again, but then sigh. 

“I still miss him.” You admit. 

“me too.” He mutters, pulling closer again. You sigh, looking out the window.

“He probably doesn’t even have a raincoat. Or an umbrella. Asshole.” You mutter, and Sans snorts. 

“i’m sure, wherever he is, he can buy one.” He mutters, running his fingers absently against your skin. He’s hoping for another kick, you know. It’s.. it’s pretty cute. You lapse into companionable silence for a while, then he speaks up again. “god, just… so much has changed. so fast. i honestly can’t figure out how so much time has gone by without me even noticing it. i feel like i just blink and the next thing has already happened, you know?”

“Oh, trust me.” You sigh. “I know. This year… even these past few months have just been…”

“batshit?” He suggests. You snort. 

“Batshit.” You agree, then yawn. “Hey. At least I think we got our battles with old ladies out of the way. You see the news? King Asshole and the human governor reached a treaty. She’s being tried by a mixed jury of humans and monsters. If she makes it that long. She IS like a million.” 

“she’s like 80.” He replies lazily, then squints at you. “also, don’t jinx us. knock on wood or something.” You groan, but lean forward to rap the coffee table. 

“No more fights to the death with old ladies.” You mutter solemnly. 

“good.” He says, then pauses, his eyes widening. “hey.”

“Hey what?” You say, feeling nervous. You don’t like the smile on his face right now; it’s the kind that usually comes before something very, very, very annoying. 

“what about doris?” He asks. 

“What?” You reply, bewildered.

“you know.” He taps your belly. “they might be a doris.”

“Oh my god.” 

“it’s a perfectly good name, we shouldn’t let one person sully it-”

“Oh my _god_.” 

“does that mean you like it?!” He’s grinning now, pleased that he’s gotten you to the point where you’re fighting the giggles very very hard. 

“I’m not sure I even like _you_ right now!” You snort, then give up, snickering. “We’re not naming the baby Doris.” 

“shame.” He sighs. “waste of a super good name…”

You’re not entirely sure you want to share a bed with this maniac right now. 

\----------------------------------------------------

You do, eventually, of course. The night wears on, your friends trickle in and out of the family room. Food is made, movies are watched, Mettaton gazes mournfully out the window at the choppy sea and the sleet. Sans opens his mouth to say something doubtlessly very annoying about how Capra’s not, like, a sailor on an uncharted mission, but you swat his chest lightly first and he thinks better of it. You hug Mettaton extra hard before you go to bed that night.

“I’m sure he’ll come home soon.” You murmur, and he sighs. 

“Yes. Soon.”

It’s probably a little redundant to note that he sounds robotic. 

You fall asleep quickly that night, even with the wind whistling outside the windows and the occasional soft ping of ice particles against the glass. Sans is just comfy, and you’re tired, and bed is so warm and cozy and…

You’re little, and your mom is calling you over. She’s got something in her hands; a cardboard box with holes. You don’t know what that could be, but you’ve always been a bright kid, and you have a pretty good guess.

“A bunny?!!” You exclaim. Your mother rolls her eyes. 

“No, Tadpole. Come and see, though!”

Oh. That nickname. You’d almost forgotten that nickname. It had sounded so awful back when Paula had been using it. You’d almost forgotten that once, it had made you feel soft and warm and special. That it had been something just between you and Mom and-

“Go check it out, kiddo!” A voice behind you urges. You spin around, and there’s your dad, all tall and gangly, that huge, wonderful smile on his face. God, it had been… it had been so long since you’d seen that smile, and this is a dream, you know it, but a wave of sense memory still comes crashing back - the scratchy feel of his stubble when he kissed your forehead, the dorky sneakers he wore when he went out for jogs, the way he’d lift you up and swing you around until you shrieked with joy and laughter.

But right. You had a task.

It was always so hard to move in dreams, so hard to keep focus! While you’d turned, the room had changed - it had started in your old house, but now it was in this one, in the lab, and your mom was downstairs… the kitchen? The sunroom? It feels so hazy! You glide down the stairs - your dad had slipped away - trying to focus. You needed to find her, because she was going to give you …. something….

“Kid, what’s up?” You turn, and Capra’s leaning against the banister. He starts out old - well, thirty-eight, which was still _old_ , but then you remember that he couldn’t look like that, not if your mom and dad were still around, and he shifts, snaps in your focus and he’s twenty-five and bored looking, too skinny, too arrogant, but happy - oh. Oh. He’d been happy, back then.

“I gotta find my mom.” Your voice is so small, and he grins down at you, arching an eyebrow. 

“No problem, kid. C’mon.” He holds out his hand and you reach up and take it, and now you can move properly, the two of you hurry through the halls, and out into the backyard.

Mt. Ebott looms in the background, so big - it’s much too close, it’s practically IN the backyard, and the glow, that hot, white glow from the barrier spills over you, almost blinding, and your heart is hammering, because you know that feeling now, it’s magic, it’s power, and then you’re on the mountain, on the cliffside, and you’re grown up again, you’re yourself, and your mom and dad are still there, and Cap is still there, and oh god, your parents had been so young, and…

They turn, hand in hand, and they walk away from you, and you look at Cap again, thirty-eight year old Cap with his suit and tie and a distant look on his face. 

“Where are they going?” You whisper.

“I’m sorry, kid.” He mutters, watching them recede.

It’s sleeting, and you can hear the ice hitting the glass of the window.

“No. No. Please.” You whisper.

“Roads get icy.” He replies.

You wake up, gasping, just before the crash comes.

 

\---------------------------------------------------------------

 

The sleet melts by the next morning, the sky clears, and by ten in the morning, there’s practically no sign of the terrible weather of the previous night.

Still. The wedding is in a week, and you insist that Sans come and look at the venue, just to make sure…. just to make sure that nothing was damaged, you tell yourself.

It’s not that you have another reason. It’s not like your dream got to you. It’s fine. 

Sans doesn’t mind, of course. He takes your hand and makes a doorway, and the two of you step through into an idyllic fall day on the cliffside. The wind is brisk and a little chilly, but the sun is bright, and it glints off the water, and yes, yes, the changing leaves are still so beautiful and…

“I don’t know what I expected.” You sigh, looking around. He looks up at you, and grits his teeth. 

“babe…” He begins, then glances over his shoulder, into the darkness of a cave that you know leads into the palace. This was where he had found his freedom, and now he has to deal with you, sulking because you’re no closer to figuring out anything about why you’d lost so much. You wince. 

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t-”

“what?!” He looks dismayed. “no! i just…” He trails off, then looks at the cave again. “it’s funny. this place. it’s so happy, but when i come here, i have questions too.” He looks seriously up at you, hesitating. “did i tell ya? about the day we busted out? one second, the kid’s walking in, next second, boom, we’re all on a pile on the floor and the kid’s ready to bust through the barrier, and i don’t…. i think i don’t… i can’t put my damn finger on it. something happened, something slipped, something changed and…” He shakes his head. 

“Baby…” You begin, and he sighs.

“i’m tired of mysteries. cody, me, ‘don’t trust him’, cap, and especially your parents. i keep looking for answers and i keep coming up short. i wish we could just… know. you know? i wish you had that answer.” He looks mournfully over the cliffside, pulling you tight against him, so you can feel every rib even through his hoodie, digging into you in that way that is hard and sharp and comforting and very much a part of him, and for a second you just sigh, looking out into the water with him. “i wish we could know what happened to them.” He repeats.

You blink. 

“Sans?” You say, very quietly, almost inaudible over the wind. He inhales slowly, then looks up at you, a strange expression on his face, like he’s trying to figure out something and it’s just eluding him, just dancing on the edges of his perception. 

“...yeah?” He finally mutters. 

When you say the next words, they almost feel ridiculous. Why hadn’t this occurred to you before? All this time, and you’d never even thought about this, never even… It almost feels hard to make your mouth move, to figure this out.

“Going back in time. Finding out what happened.” You begin, swallow hard, then let out a strained laugh, your eyes just a little too wide. 

“Why the fuck can’t we?!” You breathe.


	153. Impact

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HEY GUYS THIS IS SUPER IMPORTANT  
> WE'RE GETTING INTO SOME ENDGAME SHIT RIGHT NOW  
> I AM SURE THAT MANY OF YOU HAVE THEORIES  
> IF YOU THINK THAT YOU HAVE IT ALL FIGURED OUT  
> PLEASE  
> KEEP IT TO YOURSELF AND DON'T SPOIL OTHER COMMENTERS  
> THE THING WITH DORIS WENT TOTALLY FUCKY BECAUSE PEOPLE GOT EXCITED THAT THEY'D FIGURED IT OUT AND SPAMMED COMMENTS ABOUT IT  
> LET'S NOT DO THAT THIS TIME  
> I WILL DELETE YO SHIT  
> I'LL GODDAMN DO IT  
> BE. GOOD.  
> \----------------------------------------  
> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>    
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

For a long moment, you and Sans just stare at each other, your brains clearly churning like… like the crappy ice cream machine on Iron Chef, the one that always broke. You feel a little broken right now, yourself. How had you not…

“holy shit.” Sans mutters.

“Yeah.” You whisper, your heart pounding. 

“...can you, though? can you-”

“I think so. I mean. I get how it works, after the Me and Gaster’s Excellent Journey-”

“oh god.” You’re not sure if the noise Sans makes is a laugh or a groan. “ok. ok. ok. ok.” He mutters out, rubbing his forehead and then looking up at you. “it’s just like…”

“I know.” You mutter, but you’re distant, pacing just a little closer to the cliffside, looking at the road below. “I know. It’s stupid. I know. But. Sans. Something’s....”

“...weird. yeah.” He breathes.

“Like. How have we not thought of this? Babe. How have we not…” You turn to him, eyes wide. “I’ve had this magic in me for months, and I haven’t, I haven’t, I haven’t used it for shit-”

“i know.” He mutters, then his eye flashes, one of those bursts of brightness and blue that always alarms you, if only because of the extreme irregularity of its occurrence. “the baby.” He says, as if this is the answer. “we didn’t think about it because we don’t know if it’ll be safe for the baby, that’s gotta-”

“The baby went with me last time.” You remind him. “They’re fine. Gerson said that they’re GOING to be fine, so long as I don’t d-” You cut yourself off, not wanting to put that thought in his head. You’re feeling something so familiar, so hard to put your finger on, and it’s hurting your brain. It feels like things are unravelling at the edges, like there’s some sort of film in front of your eyes that’s dissolving and-

“this is insane.” Sans mutters. “this is batshit insane. i shouldn’t be saying this. i shouldn’t be _thinking_ this. this is, it doesn’t, uh, it…” He screws his eyes shut and reaches out for you, taking your hand. You reach back, squeezing it hard, feeling each warm bone in your own soft hand, your skarm drumming nervously on your leg as you try. “i… i just…”

“Say it.” You whisper, staring out at the curve in the road down below the cliff face, trying not to picture it and trying to picture it at the same time. “Please. Just say it.”

“fuck.” He mutters, and scratches his skull again. “i feel like… if we don’t do this now, like we just…”

“Like we won’t do it.” You complete. 

There’s a miserable sounding swallow from next to you. 

“Something weird is happening.” You mutter, and again, he gulps before he voices his agreement. 

“something’s not right. but it’s even more than that. i feel like… fuck, uh, this is so stupid, it’s like, uh….” He hesitates, looking pained. “it’s like… no matter what... “

It dawns on you suddenly, where you’d felt this feeling before. It had been weeks ago, when Capra had ordered you to take his magic, to drain his soul. There had just been… there had been no future where that wasn’t what you did. There had been no options, no alternatives, you’d just reached out and done it and now-

“We’re doing this.” You whisper. “I think we _have_ to do this.”

“shit.” Sans mutters. “was hoping it was just me.” 

“Shit.” You agree.

“what… what are the rules? dad said there were rules what-”

“We can’t change anything. We can’t change a goddamn thing. If we go back and we do a thing that didn’t happen back then, then we’ve fucked it all. We’ve fucked the universe. Gaster said everything would fall apart.” You mutter. Sans grimaces. 

“god, we really shouldn’t - we shouldn’t -” 

He can’t finish. He knows just as well as you do that right now, this isn’t an option, because…

“We have to.” You murmur. “Because… because I think in the future, we’ve already done this, because… oh, god, this hurts my head, um, shit. We… maybe we shouldn’t…” Saying that feels like relief, like you’re absolving yourself of something. “We don’t… we don’t have to, right, that can’t be how time flows-” 

You’re contradicting yourself, trying to convince yourself and…

Oh, god, the universe doesn’t seem to like that.

The ground beneath you begins to shake, at first imperceptibly and then with greater violence, the edges of your vision begin to blur, the air feeling thin, feeling like it’s getting sucked out of your lungs and shredded up like confetti, and your _arm_ hurts, of course, of course, it would be the first thing to fall apart, it was barely there anyway, and Sans’ voice sounds oddly hollow as he yells out-

“shit! no! stop it! we’re going! we’re going!”

Immediately after he yells out, the chaos stops. The world snaps back into focus, and you gasp for breath, suddenly drenched with sweat, breathing hard and clinging to his hand and looking down at the cliffside as the sound of sirens begin to rise, lights flickering on as the township of Ebott reacts to the … what would they call it, an earthquake, probably, but it had been so much shorter and so much worse-

“babe.” Sans shakes you out of your reverie. “we… we gotta go.”

You swallow.

“Shit. Okay. Yes.” 

You have to go. 

The two of you turn away from the cliffside, facing the flat, grassy area where you were going to have your wedding tomorrow, and you bite your lip and mutter, 

“Well. Fuck. I hope I remember how to do this.” 

You do. That dark core of magic has always been there, has always been burning inside of you - well, not always, but ever since you’d swiped it from Gaster - and it’s so easy, that’s the crazy goddamn thing, it’s so easy to tap into, now that you’re actually trying. 

You tear a hole in the universe, in every fucking principle, and time

drags  
you  
in.

Sans’ hand is still tight in yours (oh thank god, thank god he’s with you) and he curls against you reflexively, holding you tight as you’re drawn in, and he’s muttering-

“it’s dark. fuck, it’s dark. it’s dark. it’s dark. it’s dark. it’s-”

Reality seals itself behind you.

(dark. it’s dark. it’s dark.) He’s chanting in your mind, and for a second you’re lost in his panic, in this still, dark place, and then you remember-

(It’s okay.) You think at him. (I remember how to see)

You tap into that store of magic once more, and reality flickers into existence all around you - reality, realities, fracturing, spiderwebbing, bifurcating, a thousand thousand worlds, a thousand thousand thousand timelines, and oh, there, a knot, a spot without bifurcation, a spot where the only possible choice was for you to do this, it almost makes you laugh-

(how do we do this?) Sans sounds so freaked out. Oh, god, Sans can’t see any of this, he doesn’t know, he’s just floating there in the dark nothingness-

(I need to focus. I need to remember exactly what that day was like, to bring it to us.) You think distractedly.

(can you? can you remember that day?) Sans thinks anxiously. 

Again, you almost laugh. 

(I’ve spent the last decade reliving it. Yeah. I remember.) You think.

You think of a little girl’s boredom, her fear turning to worry, the rain earlier in the day, the clouds over Ebott, of the hours creeping later, her hands shaking as she tries to feed Ghost kibble, wondering when, when is too long, when she should call, who she should call, fearing… fearing the worst, heart pounding in her chest, pacing, 2 AM, 3 AM-

But no. That all came later. First was the boredom. First was the mild pleasure that your parents were running late, that you could watch extra cartoons, and then before that -

You remember, and a doorway flickers open as a tendril of time balloons in front of you, all crazy colors and whirling images and-

You and Sans are on the cliffside, and it’s just finished raining, and a hundred feed behind you, the barrier pulses with seductive energy, and you drop to your knees, shivering, as Sans unscrews his eyesockets, looking around in amazement and horror. When he spots the barrier, he nearly skitters back like a startled cat, but then he sees you, and his eyes do that familiar sweep - your soul, Dot’s soul -

“are we… here?” He rasps, and you grimace, taking a deep breath.

You remember everything about this day. You remember how it fucking… tastes, how the air had been so damp, so chilly -

“We’re here.” You breathe.

“what time is it? are we-”

“We’re on time.” You mutter, feeling cold and horrified and… oh god, you’d see them again. Just for a moment, just for an instant, you’d see them again… “We need to… move.” You clamber to your feet again, feeling dizzy.

“where?”

“Near the … near where the crash happened. There’s an EbbCo observatory tower back then - well, now. Like the one from that trail last spring. There used to be so many, and this one is close. I remember from the reports, It’s unmanned. We can go there.” You whisper. 

“you’re sure?” He mutters, and you nod.

“I used to think about … I used to have these nightmares that I was locked in there, watching, and I couldn’t stop them, I couldn’t stop it... “ Realization dawns on you slowly. “Oh god.” You mutter, running your hand distractedly through your hair. “They’re coming true…”

“just… just think of it… it’s not real…” Sans tries to calm you, but there’s horror in his voice too.

“We....” You take a deep breath. It’s not real. It’s not real. This is just like watching a tape. A film clip, that’s all. One you can see and feel and taste, but a movie all the same. You can’t change it. It’s not real. “We need to go.” 

Feeling hollow and broken, you slice a neat doorway into the locked, unmanned observatory, and you and Sans step through.

The clock says 5:23 PM, and the window overlooks the sea, the setting sun, overlooks a curving stretch of road along the cliffside, and a guard rail that is not yet destroyed.

“when-”

“Soon.” You mutter. 

You and Sans stand there in silence, staring out the window. The first set of headlights that drives by makes you flinch, but it’s not your parents’ car, it’s a little Camry that sails right past, no problem, and then there’s another, going the other way, a Jaguar climbing its way cautiously up the mountain, slowing down as it approaches the curve of the road that your parents would soon skid on, soon die on, and-

It pulls off the road, towards the observatory tower, and you see the dim shape of a man stepping out before he steps off the road, closer to the tower, and you’re too high up to see what he’s doing down there…

Sans sucks in a breath, his digits twitching as the pinpricks of light in his eyes search the ground as he mutters -

“who’s he, who’s that, what just-”

“Sans.” You whisper, and nod off to the side. “Lights.” 

Your parents’ car comes rocketing down the mountain, and the driver doesn’t even begin to brake. There’s no ice, that’s not what had caused this, the car’s not fucking stopping! It’s not stopping, and you can’t look, and you want to look, you need to know, because something’s definitely not right here, there’s a man lurking at the base of the tower and something’s not right-

Impact.

The car slams into the guardrail and the rail buckles and bursts outwards, but the car doesn’t go sailing over the cliff, no, it shudders to a halt and now that it’s precariously close to the edge of the cliff, you can see that the brake lights are on, and… 

And they haven’t gone over the cliff and sailed into the sea at all! They’re, they’re….

The driver’s door opens, and 

It’s your dad.

You let out a pathetic, strangled sob - he’s there! He’s alive! How could he be alive, how could he be okay, and he’s running over to the passenger door, but it’s already swinging open and it’s your mom, it’s your mommy and daddy and they’re so young, and the sun is right behind them but you can still see them, they’re hugging each other and gasping and shaking with hysterical laughter, and you can’t tear your eyes away, not even when Sans speaks up.

“...how?” He asks quietly. “they’re… they’re ok. so. how?”

“Maybe-” Your voice is slightly hysterical now. “Oh, god, baby, maybe it’s us, maybe we save them, maybe we take them back with us, maybe that’s what happened, maybe we take them back, we could go, we could take them back-

“but they found the bodies-”

“Oh, god, fuck, I don’t know, we can… I can figure them out, I’ll bring them back in time when they die, I’ll bring them here and … they were just skeletons, more or less when they found them, we… it could … I, I’m going, I’m going to save them, I can still-”

“wait.” You’ve turned to the door but Sans’ arm snaps out and he grabs your wrist.

The man who had arrived in the Jaguar just moments before is striding towards them, and-

He’s tall, and trim, and he has glorious black hair, and he’s wearing a fucking tailored suit and when he turns - he turns just a little, just in profile - and you recognize him at once, and it makes no fucking sense, because this is twelve years ago and he looks just the same as when you’d seen him a few weeks ago, how could that be-

“what the fuck….” Sans whispers, and you blink rapidly, trying to make sense of all of this, because he couldn’t… he couldn’t be here, now and-

He looks irritated, even from a distance. He points at your dad, and then at the car, and he says something.

Your parents stop hugging each other, and…

“fuck, no..” Sans whimpers next to you. 

They move like automatons, walking slowly but steadily back to the car.

“No. No. No.” You whisper, horrified realization crossing your mind.

The hood of the car is crumpled, and white smoke is coming out, but they still get back in their seats. You can hear a terrible groaning sound even through the observatory glass as the car backs up, scraping against the busted guard rail, and then…

It turns back down the mountain, back on the road. 

It takes a few hundred feet for them to build up enough steam, but eventually they’re going fast enough that when your father abruptly cranks the wheel to the right on the straight away, now far past the guard rail, they soar, suspended in the air for a split second that feels like an eternity, before the car plummets, dropping out of sight, out of view, and god, god, you pray the impact kills them first because there is no saving them now…

“fuck.” Sans rasps, and the two of you look down in numb horror as the familiar form of your goddamn next door neighbor, Dennis Smith, saunters back to his Jaguar, pulls back onto the main road, and continues his path up the mountain.


	154. Chiller

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
>     
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
> [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

For a moment you can’t react, you don’t know what to do, you just stare out the window, trying to process this as your brain grinds helplessly against this new information.

“that was him. that was the guy. dennis smith. neighbor guy.” Sans says slowly. “but he looks the same.”

“We gotta go.” You say quietly.

“but… but that was… uh…” He’s already reaching in his pocket - his instinct must be to call the police or something, but-

“This is the past. We… we can’t do anything.” You force yourself to say. “It’s like a movie, remember. We can’t change anything. We gotta go back to our time.”

(You’d just seen your parents die, you’d just seen them die, oh god, oh fucking god, they’d almost been fine and then they’d died and nothing made sense and you’d SEEN it)

“shit.” Sans mutters, but he doesn’t protest. He just holds out his hand, bracing for the darkness and the fear, and before you can hesitate any longer, before you can stew on this, do something dumb, change your mind -

destroy the goddamn universe

\- you tear a hole in the world, tapping into that black place, and this time, it’s easy to focus, to sort through the timelines, you _need_ something to focus on, after all, and you’re no longer distracted by the cascade of images, of impossible fractured ribbons of time, you just remember the sun on your face and the wind and the colors of the leaves and your wedding being tomorrow and the open maw of the cave on the cliffside and then

You’re back. 

You’re back exactly where you left, and you have just enough time to see another gaping hole in the universe seal up behind you, the barest flash of blue - Sans’ hoodie as the two of you disappear back in time to learn the truth - before both doorways seal up and you and your fiance are left blinking in the sun.

Sans is still going for his phone, but his eyes do the expected flick - your soul, Dot’s soul - and he mutters, as he starts a call;

“gaster’s energy. s’ smaller. you used some up.” 

You didn’t think anything could surprise you right now, but this does catch you off guard. You try to lean and see your soul, but that had never worked. Still, Sans is right. You can _feel_ it, if you concentrate. There’s less power there, somehow. 

“Finite resource.” You mumble, as Sans says, into his phone-

“cliffside, mt. ebott. where the barrier came down.” 

He hangs up, and you blink at him. 

“What was that?” He looks at you, puzzled.

“what was what?”

“That phone call? Who did you call? Asgore? The human cops? They’ll need more than-”

“babe.” He cuts you off, suddenly looking very, very concerned. “ **what phone call?** ”

A sinking feeling begins to grow in your chest, blossoming until it dominates your fresh grief and confusion and impotent rage.

“You don’t remember calling anyone right now.” You mutter. He grits his teeth.

“...no.”

Oh fuck. 

“Sans.” You try again, quieter. “If we were to try to go home right now…” Your mind is clanging up against something, some restriction, but you force, you force the thought. “Can you… can you move right now?” 

He thinks about this for a second, and his hand twitches, then he almost moves his foot, scuffing his ancient Chucks against the grass, and then he whispers; 

“fuck. no.”

You gulp. 

“Me neither.” You admit, and the barest flicker of a memory, a phrase that you think you’ve heard a thousand times, dances through your head;

_“And if you ever do figure out what I am, you are to call me, and then you are to wait exactly where you are for my further instructions. You are not to panic. You just need to wait for me. Forget about your call, just be patient, just wait. Do you understand?”_

Oh. Oh. God. 

Suddenly, you understand.

\-----------------------------------------------

You and Sans are patient.

You have to be.

You stand there, next to him, still clutching his hand, as the sun creeps slowly along in its path, and you wait. 

You wait until you hear the soft crunch of boots ascending the path up to the cliffside, and Dennis Smith, looking amused and reproachful, comes into view. His mane of long black hair is loose, and his blue eyes are bright, and even in worn blue jeans and a National Public Radio donor drive t-shirt, he is terrifying. 

“My clever girl.” He says, sounding a little remorseful, and more than a little proud at the same time. “You figured it out, didn’t you?”

You still can’t move. But at least - oh, god, at least the patient part of the command is over, and you and Sans scream out at once:

“You KILLED my parents!”

“mother _fucker!_ ”

Dennis sighs, shrugs, and then taps Sans on the shoulder. “Be silent.” He says. “I have some questions, and we won’t get anything done with language like that.” Sans’ mouth opens, and, realizing he’s been struck dumb, he moves and - “Oh no. Do not harm me.” Dennis sighs. “I thought we were good on that one.” He meets your eyes again, and repeats, “Neither of you are to even attempt to attack me.”

The knowledge that this must be so settles on you like concrete forming around your limbs. You feel helpless.

You _are_ helpless.

“Now.” Dennis stalks forward, smiling again, and inspects you, looking you over. “Now, my clever pet, however did you figure me out? I was meticulous. Wait. Wait. Let me guess…” His brows furrow, but you interrupt him.

“What… what are you? How did you - that was years ago, but you looked the same, did you - did you travel through time just to kill my parents, why-”

“Time travel?” Dennis arches an eyebrow. “No, pet, time travel isn’t real. Nobody can do that. And believe me, I’ve tried.”

You almost open your mouth to disagree with this, but the barest brush of Sans’ fingers against your own advises you otherwise.

“Then, who are you?” You murmur, and he laughs, delighted. 

“Oh, the most wonderful thing about telling you to forget me is that I get to tell this story over and over again. And let me assure you, kitten, it never gets old.” He says brightly, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear fondly. You want to recoil, want to twitch away, but you are absolutely frozen, forced to listen. “Tell me what you’ve gathered so far.”

“You’re a mage.” You say at once. “You have powers like Capra’s. You told my dad to drive off a cliff and he did, you killed my parents.” 

“Very good, sweetheart.” He says, just a little condescendingly. “You _are_ such a clever girl.” 

The way he talks to you makes your skin crawl, it makes you want to scream, it’s so very fond, so very… _familiar_. Like he’s talked to you a thousand times, and, oh fuck-

“We’ve talked about this before. You made me forget.” You murmur, the realization dawning on you, and he tips his head back and laughs.

“Oh, you say that every time. You never did figure out the parent thing, though, that’s quite new. I suspect it’s because of the new, er, source of power. Mine, I mean. The Dust. And, well, I didn’t go over to visit last night. It was raining, you know. I didn’t much feel like walking through all that, and now look. Here we are, with you clearly having done some investigation against my orders. Well. I can learn from that.” He shrugs. “I’ll clearly need to reinforce more frequently, in the future.” His eyes brighten and he looks indulgently at you. “Another experiment. God bless,” He takes a deep breath and looks around like he’s seeing the beautiful scenery around you for the first time, “More than two hundred and fifty years on this earth, and there is still so much left to learn!” 

“Two hundred fifty years?” You repeat, eyes widening in spite of yourself, and he lets out a booming laugh.

“Yes, darling. Tell me, do I look my age? Tell me I look handsome.” 

“You look handsome.” You reply robotically, and he snickers.

“Thank you, pet. Oh, this is lovely. A chance to get out here, get some fresh air, take in the sights - did you notice the osprey nest in that tree? And I get to have another chat with you. I should be thanking you for being so nosy.” He says cheerfully. “Consequences will be in order, of course. He’s been driving you to dig around. Bad influence.” He sighs, nodding at Sans. “I suppose we’ll get rid of him today, once we’re done catching up. I don’t know what kills a skeleton, but I imagine falling a few hundred feet kills just about anything.” He nods at the cliffside, then shrugs. Seeing the look on your face as you process this, he sighs, rolling his eyes. “Relax, dear heart.” 

Against your will, the scream that had been building in your throat extinguishes itself. 

“I am sorry. I truly am. I know how much you enjoyed him. And god himself knows it has made my life easier, these past few months, having monsters next door. Well. You can keep the lizard and the fish. The dog, too. The robot, if you really insist. They all make you happy, and most of them bleed enough to make me happy too. The other skeleton will probably have to go. He’s…. clever.” Dennis sighs, running a hand through his glossy black hair. “See, pet? Life won’t be all that bad. Dennis will take care of you like he always has.” He coos.

“...Why?” You whisper, struggling against the order to relax, trying to allow your rage and confusion and fear out, but managing only polite engagement.

“Well, that goes back to ‘who,’ doesn’t it?” He chuckles. “You see, once upon a time, I was a bastard boy in a tiny village, being raised by a woman that _everyone_ knew was a witch. And trust me. They told me, and for what they believed my mother could do, they hated me. I was loathed. If I hadn’t always been smarter and faster than the other boys, they might have outright killed me. But, oh, mum took care of me, and she studied her bible and she tried so hard to be proper and upright and to raise me proper and upright, but when the war came and I told her I was joining the rebellion, she told me her secret. She was worried about me dying, you know.” He arches his eyebrow. “Ironic, really. So she told me to climb Mt. Ebott and to bathe in the light and that it would be my sword and my shield and she was _right_.” He says, grinning to himself cheerfully as he remembers his former glory.

“Oh, in that war, darling, I was spectacular. After so many years of being shat upon by every rotten-toothed gape-jawed drooling yokel, being able to _finally_ spill some blood was…” He trails off and grins sunnily, looking up at the sky, then turns back to you. “Oh, that reminds me, sweetling, when I was last in your house I went and took your friend Peter’s Hamilton soundtrack, I’ve read so much about it, but I can’t figure out how to get the damn thing to play on my computer, do you think you could help me after we’re done here?” 

Sans might not be able to speak, but you can feel just how amused he is without even having to look. After spending so much time talking with Capra about his damn rapping founding fathers, to be actually talking to this guy, and for him to be such a _shit!_... Oh, this is just the goddamn worst. 

“...You were in my house?” You say slowly, and he laughs again. 

“Oh, I’m getting ahead of myself. You know me. I could talk about this for hours and hours.” Again, you feel the faintest pressure from Sans’ hand, and you realize that he wants you to encourage this. Of course he does. The man had come right out and said it - after this chat is over, Sans dies.

A bitter, resigned feeling washes through you as you realize the incredible, idiotic, fucking… stupid situation that you’re in right now. 

To get through this situation, to find time to figure out a way out…

Oh, goddamn it, you’re going to have to make your enemy monologue.


	155. Jokerman

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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“Wait. I don’t understand.” You make your eyes big, your voice soft and almost childlike, and Dennis Smith just _beams_ at you. 

Sans, by your side, clearly knows what you’re doing, trying to drag this out, buy some time to think, but still you can practically sense that part of him, deep down, would be giving you a little smirk at that voice. Okay. It’s ridiculous.

But it works.

“What are you confused about, pet?” Dennis simpers, patting your hair again, and you recoil inwardly, but you refuse to flinch. 

Keep him talking. 

“How?” You ask quietly. “How did you live so long?” Dennis chuckles ruefully, running his hand through his hair and glancing over his shoulder at the gaping maw of the cave behind him. 

“The barrier.” He says with a shrug. “It was… oh, it was life itself. It called to us, you know. The mages. We all made our way here for a taste, sooner or later. Those of us clever enough to feel it.” He turns, now wistfully addressing the mouth of the cave. “Not everyone is born being able to use magic, you know. The number’s closer to… say, one percent, according to my experiments.” He glances over his shoulder to beam at you. “We’re special, you and I.” He says with a laugh. “Though, God above, we should pray to be half as special as the mages who made the damn thing in the first place. Now _that_ was clever.”

“What do you mean?” Keep him talking. Keep him talking. 

“Sweetling, they took the monsters’ energy, and they turned it against them! They were like you, or at least, the mastermind behind the whole scheme must have been.” 

“Like me?” You repeat, blinking. 

“You know. I’ve _explained_ this. I’m a persuader. People do what I tell them to do. But you… You’re a **leech** , pet. Oh!” He chortles, as a low growl emerges from the frozen skeleton beside you. “Somebody doesn’t like that, does he?! Hush.” He reinforces, looking at Sans, and Sans falls silent again, though the fury in him is palpable even though neither of you can move or even feel each other further than the hands pressed into each other. “It’s not a bad thing, being a leech. I was always rather envious of you and your father.”

Your father. Of course. Of course, if he’d been magic, and Paula had been magic, and you were magic…

“Anyway!” Dennis interrupts your train of thought. “The barrier. It siphoned the magic of the monsters away. Contained them in the center of a sphere that was constantly drawing - not enough to be felt, not enough to hurt, just enough to keep them restrained underground, just enough to give us access to all the power we could possibly grab. I had excess power in every cell, in every pore. I never did learn healing, but I learned enough from a healer mage, how to redirect that power and halt my aging. And then, I had all the time in the world to be… an intellectual.”

“Are there other human mages today, then? Besides me and you and-”

“Your friend Peter.” He completes the sentence when you abruptly cut yourself off, realizing that even talking about Capra might not be the wisest. “Of course. Your little cousin, Frisk. They’re a much stronger leech than you, of course. None of the substitutes, no pulling magic from blood or dust or… other sources.” He winks at you. “I’m very much looking forward to seeing what they can do.”

Oh, you don’t like the way he says that. You try to distract him, 

“S...so what happened to all the other ones? I thought you said it was one percent, so-”

“One percent of humans have the latent magical gift. They need to have access to a source of magic to be able to use it. Not many people have that, these days. Too civilized to consider drinking blood or eating dust, too uptight to consider _your_ method, pet.” He snorts, then glances at the heavens. “Not that you ever needed to fuck him. Goodness, between you and Peter, it was almost painful to watch. Two blunt instruments wielding your powers in the clumsiest of ways. You could steal the magical gift from anyone, sweetling. Hell, even from me, if I hadn’t told you very clearly not to. Now, that was a command I never allowed to slip.” He sighs. “It’s a burden, you know. Maintaining focus on all of these. Your friend Peter was a rank amateur. The idiot couldn’t maintain concentration on a single thought, much less multiple commands.”

Oh. Oh, you file that away, just in case, just in case you ever get to see Capra again.

“But, of course, that percentage of mages used to be higher. That’s what you were asking about, right? In my day, well, it was maybe ten, fifteen percent of humans that had the potential.” Dennis reminisces, distracted. You blink at that, surprised, and he waits, expectant, almost… excited? He’s practically rocking on his heels as you form your next question.

“Then why are there so few now?”

He flashes an enormous, toothy grin that does not reach his eyes. “Me.” He breathes, delighted. 

“You?” You repeat, and he giggles for a second, his eyes bright. 

“Well. I did what any young lad with godlike powers would do upon learning that he could make anyone do anything. I decided to be a god.” He snickers. “And for a while, trust me, it was fun. But some mages believed I was being too…. flashy. They were right, of course. A gift like mine is best used with finesse. But, well, when they came to Ebott to forcibly stop me… I stopped them first. I nearly died, but damn if I didn’t find the most gruesome ways to kill a bunch of mewling quims.” He says brightly. “And that, well. That made me realize. It wasn’t… safe, to have so many mages around. It wasn’t safe to have anyone who might challenge my fun. So.” He chuckles again, and flashes his gleaming teeth. “I experimented.” 

Oh.

Several thousand thoughts form at once, and he seems to read them all on your face, still laughing. “I had _time_ to figure so much out, pet. I had so many questions! For one, mages had been coming to the barrier for centuries, had set up ancient hideouts underground in these caves even before that-”

“The lab!” Something clicks. “That was yours!”

“Clever girl.” He gives your head another affectionate ruffle, then frowns. “Darling, what conditioner have you been using - unimportant. Once you’ve moved in with me properly, we’ll fix that. Yes. The lab was mine. For a time, it was easiest to be closest to the barrier, and that’s where the cave system lead, directly there. I was ever so fascinated with what might be on the other side. I set up any number of experiments to try and find my way through, but those old mages were clever. I tore my way to your void more than a few times, ran endless experiments there, but… no, the only way to get though seemed to be sending a mage child. And then, the damn things never could get out. I had so wanted to taste monster blood.” He snorts. “And now I’m sick of the stuff, ironic. Anyway. There was a cave-in, yadda yadda yadda, I’ll spare you the details, long story short, I’m brilliant and clever and realized that the place where I built my house was in a natural bowl of magic amplification-”

“What?”

“Do try to keep up, darling, your parents figured all this out. Why do you think you lived in such a staggeringly expensive place? It was nearly ideal for absorbing magical… oh, I don’t know, radiation, I suppose, from the barrier. If you knew what you were doing. I did. Your mother and father figured it out fairly damn fast too.” 

Well. Son of a fucking bitch. “Is… Is that why you killed them?” The anger and fear are creeping back into your voice, and Dennis’ smile grows wider. 

“Relax.” He hisses, then shrugs and shakes his head. “No, darling, they were on the verge of tearing the barrier down and I just couldn’t have that. The barrier was so damn convenient. I’ll have it back one way or the other. Your friend Undyne’s blood is certainly gratifying to drink, but it does taste vile-”

“Gratifying?” He glares at you for interrupting, then snarls;

“That bitch. Chopped down. A hundred and fifty year old Japanese White Pine. One that I had carefully maintained for a hundred. And fifty. Fucking. Years!” He takes a deep breath, narrows his eyes, then hisses, “For a Christmas decoration. And to make it worse, you used multicolored LED lights.” He takes a breath, pauses, then groans. “I’m sorry, pet. I know you don’t mean to be tacky.” 

“...It’s… I … I understand.” You lie quietly, trying to breathe. “I…” 

“I know. I know.” He traces a finger along your cheek, and sighs. “I was going to kill you too, that night, you know. The way your mother and father fought my commands, I was worried about what you’d grow into. But when I knocked on the door the next day, and you ran forward and hugged me without a second’s hesitation - well. Well. I figured it out later, of course. You thought I was Peter. We do look quite similar, which only makes sense. With his gift, with that soul, he must be one of mine.”

“One of yours?” You repeat numbly, and he laughs. 

“My great great great great great grandson, perhaps? I thought I’d pruned all the branches of my family tree by the time I realized the threat, but well… I might have been a god, but I was also a gardener.” He shrugs. “I planted my seed.”

Oh, fucking gross. Just… gross. 

“In any event. I did grow fond of you. I kept you more or less alive all those years, pet. You’d wander out on the beach and I’d see you, and I’d bring you dinner and we’d just talk. It was… fun. I do believe I’d grown lonely, and you were a balm to this old man’s heart, dear one. So we talked. For years and years. Even once the barrier fell, even once you brought your beau home, we’d always find time to chat. I never meant to hurt you, even when I was fomenting unrest. It was never about you, love.” 

“Fomenting… Oh. God. Fuck fuck fuc-”

“Language!” He chides. 

“The men in black! All the monster attacks! Fucking… Doris! That was-”

“Simple.” He laughs. “It was so easy to try and make a person act on what’s already in their head. It’s much harder to make it go the other way. I am sorry about your friend Cody. I do believe I pushed too hard, there. He may be a bit… er, broken.” He sighs. “I just wanted the monsters to reconsider being on the surface because… well… it would be so convenient if they put the barrier up again, if you understand. It would save me so much effort if they would just realize that the barrier was for their protection, too! It was keeping them safe from us-”

“fuck. you.” Sans grates out from between clenched teeth, and Dennis’ eyes widen.

“You stubborn little fuck!” He giggles, looking between the two of you. “Oh, I can see why you love him, darling. That is _delightful_. Sans, do release her hand.” To your horror, his bones unwind from your grasp - you can feel the tremor as he struggles, but he does, he releases your hand and then, “Good lad. Now… if you would just start ambling towards the cliffside, thank you.” Dennis sighs, nodding in the appropriate direction. “Now, where was I. Ah, yes. I never meant for you to be hurt, sweetling. I love my little pet. You’re not strong enough to put up the barrier yourself, of course, but I’ll have you working with that cousin of yours in no time, if the monsters don’t do it first. I think I have enough anger simmering that something big should be coming, soon. So many angry humans. They feel small, next to beings with magic.” He snorts, then grins again. “They should.” 

“You want to.. oh, god, please don’t, I don’t want to-”

“You will be my pet one way or the other, precious. You’re useful. It’s been some time since I’ve had such a pliable leech. Sans will have to die, of course. Papyrus too. And, oh, certainly Peter, if he ever dares to show his face again. He’s caused me enough trouble-”

“How?” 

“Don’t. Interrupt.” He snarls, then sighs. “Peter is just strong enough that I don’t feel confident that an order would work on him. Generally, one persuader must be much, much more powerful than another to be able to order them about. When I found my father, I learned that the hard way. He nearly killed me first. In any event, Peter’s been a pain in my ass. Never that strong, but strong enough that I didn’t feel confident in coming over and chatting, and well, pet, I missed you. I was trying ever so hard to be nonviolent, but next time I see him, I’ll shoot the damn fool.” He laughs. 

“So…” Your voice is shaky. “So that’s it, then. You’ll kill my fiance, force me to be your friend, try to make me use my powers to trap all the people I love underground, you’ll enslave my cousin, you’ll…”

“Well… yes, that’s almost all the bad news.” Dennis sighs, and glances over your frozen shoulder, watching Sans make his way to the side of the cliff. “There is one last bad thing, love.” Leaning just a bit closer, he rests his hand on your swollen stomach, and raises his eyebrows. “This.” He says deliberately, “This will have to go.” 

The horror of this statement sets in in stages, but Dennis is already speaking. 

“I’ll give you your goodbyes. But Sans. When I say “jump”, you will step off the side of that cliff and fall all the way to the ground, you understand? No shortcuts. No mysterious void holes. You will fall and I will see what can kill a skeleton.” He says cheerfully, then turns to you. “And you. When I say so, you will forget Sans in his entirety. I will wipe him from existence. You will not mourn, because you will have nothing to mourn. Understand?” He says, cupping your cheek. 

Oh, fuck, no, no, no, no. 

Not like this.

“C-can I say goodbye first?” You whisper, and Dennis sighs, looking at you fondly. “Please.” You try again. “Can I just kiss him? One last time?” 

“Very well. But remember, you are not permitted to try to hurt me. And, of course, no shortcuts, none of that. You have to go over to Sans. Go on. You can go.”

You take a step towards Sans, then another, brain spinning madly as he stands on the edge of the cliff, and as he turns his head, he sees something in your eyes, and his expression spirals - first worry, then horror, then fury, and then… oh, god, you love this man, and one of his eyelids pulls down into a lazy wink that even Dennis can notice-

“What are you-” He begins, but it’s too late, because your next step isn’t onto grass, your next step is into somewhere dark, darker yet darker-

Because Dennis had told you that you had to go over to Sans-

He just hadn’t said _when._


	156. Futura

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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You float in the darkness, a speck of dust suspended in an infinite tank of pitch black, distilled time, and for a moment, you just -

Okay, you scream a little.

Dennis’ order to _relax_ keeps sliding around you, slippery coils of calm that keep whispering in your ear, _heeeeeeyyy, it’s chiiiiiillll, we’ll figure it out, just be coooooooool_ and they’re so damn seductive that you very nearly want to believe them. You’ll figure it out! You’ve got tiiiiiiime!

Except, well, you don’t. 

Sans had noticed before, but you can certainly feel it now; that reserve of time energy in the center of your soul is a finite resource, and every second you spend in here is draining it, putting the hourglass back on its side, letting it trickle out and-

Oh, god, you didn’t want to know what would happen if you were still here when that magic ran out.

Okay. 

Okay. 

You have to do something, and time is running out, even here, even where time is infinite. 

Make a list:

1) Save Sans.  
2) Save yourself.  
3) Stop Dennis from doing that creepy, creepy shit.

There. Totally doable. You could do it. You could just… warn, you could warn yourself, you’d be prepared, you’d go back and find a spot and you’d-

running out of time-

You push yourself into that world of timelines, that tapestry of technicolored pasts, and floating in the air, you pick a point, a point where you KNOW you won’t disrupt time too much, right after the fight in EbbCo, right after Doris. It’s a point in time that you remember vividly, that you can practically taste, and so when you reach out again, fuck, there you are in your still, dark bedroom, all alone.

The air smells like Sans, and he’s got a dirty hoodie on the ground and the Badbad book is on the bed, and you have a moment where that coil of calm slips, where you want to cry and scream and panic, but then, as you scrabble along the desk for a pen, you realize with sinking certainty that, well….

You’ve already done this.

It didn’t work. 

You sink to a seat on your bed, uncapping the pen and already knowing what’s going to happen as you flip to a blank page in that stupid notebook, getting ready to leave yourself a note that you have to leave. You _have_ to do this, or everything falls apart, but as you put pen to paper, you’re only able to force out:

Don’t

Trust

and then shit, shit, you try to write Dennis, not thinking, not thinking that you can’t do that because you can’t change the past, because there is one rule and that’s that if you try to change the past the universe will fall apart

Not that it really matters. You can’t write Dennis, because you can feel it now, another one of those silky cords of power constraining you.

( _”You can’t tell anyone about us, pet. This is our little secret.”_ )

You almost laugh, you really almost do. At least now, you know why you’d been such a vague little asshole about who couldn’t be trusted! Him! It was him, it was him, it was him this whole time, and you couldn’t do a goddamn thing about it, you could just do what you’d always done here, what you’d always done in this loop, so you write the final word and complete the phrase, and your power is still dwindling, you don’t have time to dwell on this, because this, this was the wrong move and-

You inhale sharply, stand up, and close the book, putting it back down on the bed, knowing that later, past-you will flip idly through and find the most useless inscription of all time. 

Don’t trust him. 

You really should have taken your own advice.

You step back through into the blackness of time, and now you’re fighting that “relax” command harder than ever, and panic is spurting up all through you, because fuck, fuck, you had just wasted magic, you’d wasted time on something that didn’t matter, and how were you going to save him? How were you going to save Sans?

Desperately, you concentrate until that spiderweb of time flickers up around you, searching, searching through the flickering images of all those different timelines, trying to find an answer and feeling a tug in your soul - you’d need to get back to Sans eventually, that order was compelling you - and fuck, you can’t find a thing, not a goddamn thing that tells you what to do, there’s just images of timelines you don’t live in, things you’d already done, and you feel sick and blurry and-

kick

\- inside you, the tiniest kick, a flutter, a reminder, and that command to relax, you shake it off at last as true horror sets in.

Dot. He was going to kill Dot. He was going to kill your baby, your baby oh god, he was going to kill your baby or worse, there were worse things he could do and-

You remember too late, Gaster urging you to be calm and composed while you’re in this space, while you’re travelling through time, because you have lost any semblance of composure, grabbing your stomach and hyperventilating while the colors move around you, while you lose your ability to navigate, and then there’s this sensation of hurtling forward, and all you can think is no, no, no, not my baby too

You’ve lost control, and you’re going somewhere now, and you have no idea where, just rocketing, moving so fast your skin hurts, and then…

It’s not smooth, like the deliberate way you’ve moved through time before. It feels like the fourth dimension has coughed you up, like a hairball, and when you are suddenly spat out into a place that is real and happening in a linear sense, you stagger forward, clutching your stomach and trying not to fall or throw up or-

“Hey!” Hands, soft hands, catch you, and a voice, high and a little amused and somehow familiar, they stop you and hold you upright as you catch your breath and the door to time snaps out of existence, and for a moment, all you can do is gasp, before you take stock of your surroundings.

It’s sunny, and warm, and still, and you’re in your parents’ old library. 

You’re in your house. 

A stranger is looking at you, her mouth turned up in a crooked smile, her green eyes - or, wait, blue? - worried. She’s young, and beautiful, and _familiar_ , something about that face, something about that smile-

“About time you showed up.” She’s saying. “C’mon, you gotta sit down. We need to talk.”

“Who… what are you doing in my… who…?” You manage, your mind swimming as you’re guided through the library, the young woman’s hand on your back, and more or less forced into a seat on a loveseat in the corner. On the coffee table in front of it, there’s a steaming mug of coffee and a huge pack of oreo cookies. The young woman blinks at you for a second, sinking into a seat next to you, then laughs.

“Man, look at you! You were just a baby! You’re barely older than me, jeez!”

“What? I’m not a baby, I’m just-” You begin indignantly, and then stop as she begins to giggle, because something in her laugh is very familiar. Something in that laugh, you hear every day, when something gets to Sans enough to make him burst out laughing. 

Oh.

“Oh, god, mom, don’t faint. You look like you’re about to faint. Are you gonna faint?” The girl says, the laughter fading. “You never told me you fainted. Oh, you don’t look good. Ohhhh man, that, that can’t be good for me-” She’s staring at your stomach now.

“...Dot?” You breathe, and she grins again. 

“Hey! Yeah! Hi!” She says, then looks you over again. “Oh my god, mom, were you like a child bride or something-”

“Okay, you have to stop saying that.” You hear yourself argue indignantly. “How much did I age, am I a hot mess now or - oh my god, you laugh just like him.” She’s really chuckling now, your daughter, like you’re the funniest thing she’s ever seen, and she gasps -

“No, no, I’m sorry, I promise, you still look, you know, okay…” She trails off, and the two of you fall silent, studying each other, and then she takes a deep breath and leans forward, hugging you so gently. “Mom.” She whispers in your ear. “I know. I know how bad things look right now. But I promise. You figure it out. It’s gonna be okay.”

Mom.

This is your kid, your baby girl(?), the being you’ve been carrying inside you through all of this, she’s here and she’s maybe, what, sixteen, seventeen, and she’s beautiful. Her voice is beautiful. The feeling of her holding you is _beautiful_.

“...You look so human.” You whisper, and she pulls away, rubbing the heel of her hand against her eye, wiping something away, and she laughs. 

“Well. Uh. Sometimes I do.” She says, shrugs, and then a second later there’s a flash, and a skeleton is smirking at you, browbones raised, and -

“Oh my god. You look so much like your father.” You mutter, reaching absently out for her cheekbone. She hesitates, and then presses her face against your hand, her smirk fading. 

“Mom.” She mutters. “I… god, I always knew this day would come. There’s a reason you don’t travel forward in time, you klutz. Puts a lot of pressure on your kids!”

“Well, I didn’t do it on purpose!” You say, then blink. “Kids?”

“Shit.” She mutters, then shakes her head. “I’m really not supposed to do spoilers. That’s one of the rules. Hey, you told me you’d need that coffee, I made it - well, you made it just for you -”

“I made it... “ Your head is spinning. “Where am I?”

“Downstairs in the kitchen while Dad and Pete and Mettaton hand you wines and tell you everything’s gonna be okay.” She laughs. Your eyes widen at that, and you lean forward, taking a big gulp of coffee - oh, god, that’s just how you like it, which makes sense because you had made it for.. you, and-

“Cap’s okay?”

“Hm?” She’s looking distractedly at you. “Should a pregnant lady really be drinking coffee anyway, _mom_? God, if this is the reason I can’t focus on calculus in school, if it’s that cup of coffee, I -”

“Dot.” You cut her off, and she stares at you in utter astonishment.

“You haven’t even _had_ me yet, how the fuck do you already have a mom voice?”

You can’t help it. You roll your eyes at your daughter. “Do we just let you swear, or…”

“Mom, I grew up in a household with you and Pete. I think my first word was a swear.”

“Oh my god, really?” You say, numbly embarrassed. She grins - oh, that shit eating smile you’d seen on her dad’s face a thousand times - and then flickers back to a human form, slightly different than the one she’d worn before. 

“You’ll have to wait and see.” She chides, then takes a deep breath, looking at the clock on the far wall. “Okay, mom. You gotta go now.” 

“What? But I just-”

“Mom said.” She says, then groans, blinks, and tries again. “I mean, _you_ said. You know everything you need to know, now. You gotta go save the day before you run out of magic.”

“What? But I don’t know, like, _anything_ -” 

“Yes.” She says firmly. “You do.” She stands up, and offers her hand to help you up, too. “You gotta go save the world, mom.”

“How?” You beg, accepting the assistance - she grabs your skarm without a second of hesitation, which, well, of course she does, and she tugs you up with a surprising reserve of strength. 

“Well.” She makes a face. “You know you don’t have to do it alone, right?”

The realization of what she’s saying crashes down on you like a wave, and suddenly -

Oh, thank god, suddenly it’s very clear what you have to do.

“Oh my god. Of course. Oh my god. You brilliant-”

“-Hey, hey, I gotta save my own ass too.” She laughs, tossing her hair, then grins at you, a little worried, a little sad. “You got this one, mom.” She assures you quietly, still not letting go of your arm. The fingers wrapped around yours shift, until they’re bone on bone, and she murmurs, “I love you so much. I believe in you. I mean. I know you can do this.” 

You stare at her for a second, just taking her in, basking, and then the clock begins to chime, reminding you - you’re running out of time, and-

“You gotta go.” Dot says. You take in a quick, choked breath, and then grab a handful of Oreos from the table, stuffing them in the pocket of Sans’ stolen hoodie. “What, you’re taking a snack for the road?” She laughs, and you shake your head. 

“Not for me. For Peter. It’s probably been a while since he’s eaten, and I can’t have that asshole passing out on me.” Oh, she beams at you for that, looking you over once more, and you can’t help it, you hold her tightly, pull her into a hug and let your fingers sink into her soft hair and you just inhale, you smell her and…

You love her. 

“Bye, mom.” She whispers. You shake your head. 

“Bye? Sweetheart…” You pull away, and lock eyes with her. “I’ll see you downstairs.” She smiles at that. “I can’t wait to meet you again. I’ll do my best-”

“You do, mom. I promise, you do.” She says.

“I love you, Dot.” You breathe, release her, and once more, force your way back into the darkness of time.


	157. Times (New), Roamin'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's a Christmas gift 4 u  
> If you wanna know what I want for Christmas it is like your money and/or adoration
> 
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> 
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He takes a sip of coffee, and makes a face. 

Chocolate in it. Motherfucking chocolate. Some people just knew how to ruin a good thing, didn’t they? 

No. No. Peter, be cool. It was nice of you to have made him coffee in the first place, even if it was all, fuck chocolatey and lukewarm and he couldn’t use it to wake himself up because it barely had any caffeine in it because all the damn caffeine had been replaced with _chocolate_ and empty calories and his boyfriend was in the fucking Adirondacks - 

ex-boyfriend

-well, whatever. It was nice of you. It was nice of you, and all these problems were so temporary. He just had to be patient.

He takes another sip, drumming his fingers on the table. Mettaton wouldn’t be an ex for long, because, god, he’d found that back-up CD last week, the one with all of your dad’s notes (not hard to crack into, by the way, the password had been Siludior, which any idiot knew was your dad’s half-elf bard for 3.5e, uh, duhhhh), and now he understood that he simply couldn’t have made Mettaton fall in love with him for the following reasons:

One: Magic required intent, and he sure as hell hadn’t intended Mettaton to fall in love with him when he’d said that dumbass thing that he’d said. 

Two: Magic required concentration, and he had NONE of that. He could barely concentrate on making this list! Oh, and, and;

Three: A magical effect terminated when the power source was cut, and he’d gone weeks with that shrivelled, ugly soul (or at least, so he’d heard, break room gossip said it was gross) and Mettaton still loved him, he had to believe that, he was just in the goddamn Adirondacks, that was all -

His internal reverie is cut off as his ears pop, and a second later, you’re standing in front of him, sweaty and wild eyed. Gross. He takes this in and groans. 

“What the fuck, does nobody knock, or-”

He cuts himself off, because you hurry over - jesus christ, you’d gotten big, when had that happened! - and haul him to his feet, before hugging him so tight that he wheezes. “Uh, kid-”

“Peter. You… fuck, I’m glad to see you.” You groan, hugging him even tighter. He blinks, squirming, then very tentatively hugs you back, trying not to be insulted by the violation of personal space. 

“I uh, saw you yesterday.” He reminds you gently, wondering just how crazy hormones can possibly make pregnant ladies. He opens his mouth to ask this, actually, then immediately thinks better of it as you pull away and study him. He’s processing something. 

You’d just called him Peter. 

“It wasn’t yesterday. It’s been weeks. I’m uh, I’m future me. I’m from the future. I’m visiting from like a few weeks later, and I am so fucking glad you’re here, because you were gone and-”

“Wait, what?” He says, though, he can’t help it… he begins to grin because; “You pulling some Terminator bullshit on me?” He chides, then looks you over again, this time taking in what you’d said. “Wait. Holy shit. Wait. Wait.” 

“Yep. Future. We don’t have a lot of time to explain, Cap, but we gotta go because things are going really really bad and I need your help-”

“Wait, what? How bad? Like… world-ending bad?” 

“Er. Potentially. Pete, c’mon, we gotta go, I need you for this.” You say, then reach into the pocket of a hoodie that he knows is Sans’. “Have you had food? You want a cookie?”

“...What the fuck. What do you mean?” He asks, pushing the cookie away distractedly. “What do you mean I was gone?”

“Gone. As in gone. As in you left Mettaton a message and then you disappeared and I figured out why just now, it’s because you left with me. I came back in time and you left with me, so we gotta hit the road because, holy fuck, Pete, if you don’t do this now either the universe falls apart or like Sans dies and I have to move in with the next door neighbor who can do mind control shit just like you and believe me, this is messed up because I am pretty sure, now that I’m here, that Sans dying and the whole Dennis thing is the best case-”

“What the _fuck_!” He exclaims again, almost laughing, and then he gasps, this big, stupid, crazy spike of adrenaline running through his body as he realizes exactly what’s going on. “Wait, so you’re telling me you’re on a crazyass world saving, fucking, fucking, fucking time travel adventure and you need _me_?”

“Pete, Cap, I’m sorry!” You say desperately. “I’m so, so sorry. I’d do it without you if I could, I promise, but I really do need you. You’re the only person who can help us right now, and I think I know how, so…” You trail off, studying him, and then it’s your turn to groan, loud and disbelieving. “Oh, you’re just _loving_ this, aren’t you.” 

“My metaphorical time travel shenanigans dick,” He says, slowly and deliberately, really just _savoring_ this moment, “is _so hard right now._ ” 

“Okay.” You sigh. “Okay, gross. Fucking… gross. Ugh. Can we just… can we just do this thing?”

“Fuck yeah!’ He says at once, a grin stretching until it’s so big it almost hurts his face. “Oh my god, yes, absolutely, let’s go save the world, ye- wait. Hang on. Mettaton.” Suddenly, his sheer thrill begins to crumble. “Shit. Is he okay, or - kid, kid, how long am I gone?”

“Few weeks. He’s really bummed out but he’ll be so happy to see you after you save the goddamn world, and speaking of which, Peter -” You tear a hole into that black place, that yawning void that is so much more intimidating than the regular void, and you hold out your goddamn hand and-

“Okay. Okay. We’re doing this. Hang on. Two seconds. Gotta… send a… text-”

He tries not to cringe as he glances over last night’s messages - a little drunk, way too overconfident-

“Hurry!”

“I am!” He snaps back petulantly, but he finishes his texts, presses send, drops his phone in his pocket and grabs your hand as two messages go hurtling out to get stalled in the network, somewhere near the Adirondacks, for the next few days. 

_Mettaton. Listen. I am so fucking sorry about this. I’ll be back. I love you. I’ll be back. It’s okay. I promise._

_I gotta go save the world._  
\-----------------------------------

(Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.) His mind almost instantly realizes that this had been a mistake when the darkness closes up around him and there is just…. NOTHING. This isn’t good. This isn’t a place humans are supposed to be, and he can’t see anything or smell anything or hear anything or feel anything that isn’t the bones of your hand, tightly gripping his-

(It’s okay. It’s okay. I just gotta do this smart. So Dennis is your like super great grandpa-)

(WHAT?!) He ignores the uncomfortable sensation of your voice in his head to focus on the horrible thing you’d just said. (BUT I CHECKED HIM OUT.)

(I know.) You think patiently back at him. (You’re gross. Anyway, look, no time! He can do what you do. He can order us around. But he stopped, for a while, because you’re here, or like, because you were there, you were living with us, and he wasn’t sure he could overpower you-)

(Okay. You are throwing like… kind of a lot at me right now.) He processes slowly. (You took it though. You took my magic. I can’t stand up to him without it, one would fucking assume. Kind of a wrench in the, uh, the plan, right? Is that a saying? I mean, I'm not even saying anything technically so the point is on some level moot, but-)

(Right.) You think at him, and then there’s a snap, a burst of energy and he can barely hear you - or like, whatever, it wasn’t hearing - as you think: (Let’s go get it back.)

The next thing he knows, he’s stumbling forward onto the polished wood of the hallway just outside the family room in your house. It’s dark and he’s disoriented and he opens his mouth but you clap your hand over it before he can say a thing, and he understands and falls silent. Okay. Not a time to talk. Got it. 

“Don’t.” A voice is saying in the other room - Mettaton! Mettaton is saying in the other room, and then there’s another voice;

“Please.”

Oh god, is that what he _sounds_ like?! He turns to you, indignant, wanting confirmation that that couldn’t REALLY be what his voice is like, but you’re glaring at him-

“oh god.” That’s Sans’ voice, and suddenly he knows where he is. Or, uh, when he is.

This is when he’d lost his magic, when you’d drained his soul, the magic evaporating up into thin air. Okay? This was a painful moment to revisit, sure, especially by revisiting it via lurking in the hallway outside of the family room and hearing the pain in the voice of the man you loved-

“I told you NOT to-” He’s saying. “Peter, are you-”

“Fine. Fine. Gotta sit-” He can hear the lie in his own voice, and then there’s Sans, classic goddamn Sans;

“don’t fucking yell at her, he just told her to-”

“He didn’t tell me to, I had to!” 

“because he told you to!”

“Because I’ve seen this part of time before!” He turns from the direction of the doorway to look at you, eyebrows raised. You grimace, waving your hand in the air, your brows knit. He remembers your thesis from this night - this is the only way that things could go down, that things had always been this way, no matter what, and he has a flash of realization - the two of you can only be here because this is the way it had happened, that this was a fixed point in time, a knot that was tied with no causal beginning or end, that this was all, _ALL_ an enormous timeloop and-

Holy _fuck_ is his metaphorical sci-fi dick ever hard!

You obviously can see that he’s enjoying this, because you roll your eyes at him, listening carefully, taking a few steps closer to the door, and then -

Something black explodes from you and - 

Everything falls still. 

He doesn’t even have a second to process this because you’re suddenly back at his side, sweating even more now (gross)- 

“We gotta move!"

“What, we can talk now?!” He blinks. 

“I Paused, dumbass! Sorry. Sorry. Uncalled for. This is just..." You gasp in a breath, your gaze distant. "Tiring. But I can’t hold both of these for very long, we gotta… c’mon, move!” You demand, yanking him into the next room.

“Oh, come on.” He says, taking in his frozen, teary form on the couch. “I do NOT look like that.” 

“I’m actually going to kill you once this is all over.” You say, but you don’t have your heart in it. You’re already making a beeline to your own frozen figure, brow furrowed. “Pete, c’mere!” You demand, and he hustles over, seeing that now is not the time to mess around. Your brow is furrowed as you look at your frozen self in the past, and you gaze distantly - that soul glance, he knew that one - before your eyes light up. “I knew it!” You whisper. “I goddamn knew it!” 

“Knew what?!” You’re distracted, reaching out towards… yourself, a thrilled participant in the world’s most depressing mannequin challenge. “_______. Knew what?!” He says, watching you move, and for the briefest second he can see it, the barest metallic shimmer in the air. You’re really breathing hard now, as you whirl on him and push your hand out forcefully, teeth grit and-

Oh, fuck, that’s-

That’s so much better…

He’s dazed for a second as he processes just how _right_ he feels right now, how much he’d been missing, holy fuck, holy fuck, this was how he was supposed to feel, this is how it was supposed to be, how had he ever, how had he let himself-

“Magic doesn’t just disappear.” You mutter, studying him for a long moment, your eyes still distant.

“Magic doesn’t… OH. Oh son of a bitch. This is where it went. This is why you couldn’t ever find it or use it. I took it right back. Oh, son of a bitch.” He stammers, and you let out one exhausted laugh.

“Yeah, Pete. Your soul’s back to normal. Your magic is back.” You mutter, then grimace. “Looks good. Let’s keep it there next time.” 

He hesitates only for a second, then nods. “Okay. Okay. Deal. What next?”

“We gotta go back.” You mutter, looking around the room, unconsciously taking a step towards frozen Sans before you correct yourself. 

“Okay. You’re right, but… back when, exactly?”

The laugh you give him isn’t exactly reassuring, but he still takes your hand, enjoying the magic still trickling back into all the little places, all the tiny spaces inside of him as you tug him headlong back into the depths of time.


	158. Courier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)
> 
>  
> 
> [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

(Okay. Okay. Okay.)

You’re back in the dark place - well, the place that was dark for Cap. For you, it was still that screaming kaleidoscope of times you’d lived, times you’d yet to live, times you could have lived, all spread out before you and-

(Fuck, this is a terrifying place. Just reminding you. Okay, boss. What’s the plan?) Capra nudges your brain, and you close your eyes - which does nothing. The timelines you’re seeing have nothing to do with physical vision, it seems.

(I.. I dunno. I know I went back to get you, because, you know. I did. Obviously I got you. And now we… okay, Cap, situation. Dennis told Sans to walk off a cliff, and when I left, he was RIGHT there on the edge. He will almost definitely tell me to do something horrible the second I show up back there. He said, though… he said you were weaker than him, but he never knew if he was strong enough to order you around…) Your time magic, stolen from Gaster so long ago, is running out too quickly, you note again, somewhat desperately. It’s got to be more than halfway gone at this point. 

(Well. Fuck.) Capra, always helpful, notes. (I mean, uh, look, I am totally untrained and I probably don’t have much magic to go on as it is because, you know, me and Mettaton? Not so much with the uh, the magic acquisition, lately.)

(Right.)

(You know, from fucking.)

(Gross. Yeah.) You think back at him, your head spinning. This was just exhausting, and maintaining the Pause had been harder, and you just did not wield magic deftly either, when it came down to it. (Dennis said we were like bulls in a china shop or something when it comes to magic. All brute force, no finesse.)

(Fuck finesse.) Capra scoffs in your head, a mixture of giddy and deeply afraid, now that the stakes have been made clear to him. (We’re good at brute force, let’s goddamn use it, yeah?) That’s just like him, of course. He’s all swagger, but well, that swagger had unintentionally worked for him for years. Maybe he had a point.

(Okay. How?) You’re trying very hard not to panic, but you keep thinking of seeing your parents sail over the cliff, and how you might see Sans do that and - jeez, this guy had a thing for cliffs, huh? (You’re a persuader without any magic in you. I’m a... a leech-) You begin, using Dennis’ term, then blink - again, to little effect. (Wait. Wait. Wait.)

(What?) Capra demands, and then, when you’re still processing, he thinks it louder. (WHAT!?)

(OW!) You think back. Oh, god, of course it would be like this, adventures through time with the world’s most annoying thirty-eight year old megalomaniac who-

(Sorry.) He thinks sheepishly, and you sigh mentally. 

God, you had missed him.

(I’m a leech...) You think again, uncertainly, and this time Capra immediately speaks up. 

(I thought you were a sponge?)

Something that’s been trying, stammering in your head, just aching to click, it finally clicks, and then, oh, nearly the whole tapestry makes sense, you nearly understand how you do it, how you save everything-

(We gotta go.) You think, and concentrate on a point of time that you definitely, definitely remember-

\------------------------------------------

“Oh.” He’s disappointed. “We’re back in the house.” It’s nighttime, and it’s still, and warm, and he can hear crickets through an open window so it must be summer. “I dunno, I just assumed we’d go to like ancient Egypt or the moon or-”

“Sssshhh!” You hiss. You’re in front of your bedroom door, and you test the handle but clearly meet some kind of resistance, and you curse quietly. 

“What’s the matter?” He barely breathes the words, but you still glare at him before pointing at the door and muttering-

“Other side. I forgot the armoire’s there.”

“What? Why?”

“To stop people like you from sneaking in while we’re asleep!” You huff indignantly, and he snickers, in spite of the worry and fear and concern because, oh, fuck, he thinks he might be getting it now. At least, he has the beginnings of an idea as to why you might have brought him back to this particular night. 

“Well. Now it’s stopping people like you from sneaking in while you’re asleep.” He can’t help but point out. You glower at him in the darkness, then painstakingly slice a doorway into your room, creeping silently up next to the bed. 

This is weird. He can see you there, through that tesseract in the universe, all curled up with Sans and not precisely as covered as you probably should be (because this wasn’t a movie and the type of sheets that always covered up women after sex didn’t exist in the real world). He nearly averts his eyes, but he wants to see what you’re doing. The other you. The pregnant you - though, like, you were pregnant back now, weren’t you (FOCUS, PETER) - is leaning over your prone, sleeping form, reaching, doing something - and then you hurry back, eyes bright and alert. You grab his hand. You’re smiling. 

“What-” He begins, but then the two of you are already beginning that lurching trip back into the dark place. He only freaks out for a few seconds in the heart pounding _stillness_ of the place, this time, before he tries again. (What just-)

(I figured it out. I figured out where my magic kept disappearing to. It went here.) You think, slow and almost satisfied. (It went now. To me. I took it. I was the only one who _could_ have taken it.) 

(Holy-) 

(Gotta keep moving, Pete. We got two more stops.) There’s that already familiar tug, like he’s being pulled forward by a hook attached to his sternum as he’s yanked out of the fourth dimension, and then-

“Christ, the house _again?_ ” He complains, sees your glare, and is about to whisper a quip at you, oh, something really annoying, definitely, when he hears voices, from down in the family room. Sound carries in this wing of the house, but he can’t help it, he creeps closer to the stairs - silently, he knows, he knows - and only catches the vaguest eye roll from you as you go to rob yourself of that good good skeleton ji- er, magic, whatever. He’s focused on the voices.

“Boyfriend.” Mettaton is saying, trying it out, really savoring the word. 

“Hey, don’t rub it in.” Past-Peter, that fucking - that _idiot_ says back, all self-conscious and stupid! He wants to go down the stairs and shake himself right now, because goddamn it, Pete, in that moment you’d had it all and you were still being an asshole, why were you always an asshole!

“Hmm. I don’t know.” Mettaton’s voice is singsong, and he knows this night, this was the one with the karaoke, the one where he’d finally taken a stand and also the night where Mettaton had done that thing with his tongue - oh, should he be listening to this? He is suddenly unclear if it is moral to be eavesdropping, because on the one hand, it’s him, but on the other hand it’s Mettaton, and Mettaton had certainly not consented to doing... things with Peter Capra while a slightly older Peter Capra eavesdropped from a staircase! “I think you want me to rub it-”

“In? Threep, if you’re doing an innuendo, that’s terrifying, none of this whole zone should be rubbed _IN_ , okay, and - mmmph”

Oh he definitely should not be listening to this.  
...  
He takes a tiny step closer.

“Uh, hey, if you’re done-” He whirls, finding you standing there, studying him, looking very unamused, and he stammers out something, the tips of his ears burning with sudden embarrassment, and he’s almost thankful when you yank him back into Time. 

The last stop is not the Party Mansion, as you so lovingly call it. It’s nowhere he’s ever been before, but it only takes a minute, hell, a second to place himself. He’s spent way too much time in caverns to not know when he’s underground. The air just tastes like limestone, and it’s always too damp, so he must be underground. Plus, well, he’s standing on a second story landing, right next to a large painting of a bone, and he can narrow it down to exactly two people who would both have a house underground - and this was a house, for sure - and would think that painting of a bone should be the sole artwork on this level. He turns to make a comment to you about this, but you’re already slipping, nearly silently, into the bedroom on the right.

No, that’s totally cool, he’s not entirely sure why he’s needed on this little adventure, he could just hang out in the hall, it’s cool. 

He almost scuffs his sneaker awkwardly against the floor, then remembers that he needs to stay quiet. Boring, he thinks petulantly, then has a moment of self-assessment. He’s on a time traveling adventure that’s led him to the house of an actual monster while you steal magic from yourself. 

Okay, maybe not exactly boring.

You come hurrying out of a doorway in space just a few inches in front of him, and grab his hand, yanking him into Time wordlessly.

(Sorry. Sorry.) You gasp. (I forgot, I almost got caught in that one. Okay. Where can we go that I can do this? Am I forgetting anything? I feel like I’m forgetting something.)

(Do what?!) He thinks. (I still don’t get it! Okay, so you stole magic from yourself. You have lots and lots of magic-)

(Power.) You correct. (I’ve got lots and lots of _power_.)

(So? How do you use that to win? I don’t get it.)

(Oh, I don’t use it. Hang on.) _Yank_ and the two of you are on the cliffside of Mt. Ebbot, right next to where the barrier had once been - oh, god, is this is, is this where it’s all happening-

“Relax. It’s a few days ago.” You assure him, then wrinkle your nose, trying to puzzle that one out. “I just needed to see it again, figure out how we want to approach this. Sans is going to be on the cliff’s edge right there, and Dennis is _here_ , so-”

“I still don’t get what we’re doing!” He barks out, frustrated, and you turn to him, and he can see now, you’re practically crackling with magic at this point, you’re up to your gills in it.

“Peter.” You say slowly. “You said it yourself. I’m not a leech.” He blinks at that. “I’m a goddamn sponge.” You murmur, and then grin. “Know the difference?”

“One’s a gross lake thing and one’s a kitchen sink thing.” He says at once (because no matter how much he might fight it, being a little shit was coded in his DNA), and you groan, shaking your head. 

“Jeez. No. The difference is… sponges hold what they’ve soaked up temporarily. You can wring them out.”

“...Are we going to wring you out? That sounds impractical, and also - okay, what are you doing.” You’ve turned to look at him, distant concentration on your face, and you raise your arm, pressing the hard bones against his chest, digging in a little. “Bud, this is really, really weird… OH.”

The magic floods into him like a tidal wave. So much magic, so fucking much, more than anyone was equipped to handle, more than anyone could possibly - oh. Oh. You’d collected it all for him. It was all for him, because apparently power mattered, and right now, he was more powerful than anything, anyone, oh fuck, he could make the entire universe do exactly what he wanted…

“We’re gonna brute force the hell out of this asshole.” He mutters, his eyes wide, as the power surges through him like an electric current.

“He thinks he’s playing chess with us.” You say, looking a little weak now but smiling with relief, seeing that it worked. Capra thinks about this for a long minute, then he grins.

“He can play whatever game he wants. Right now? Up-up-down-down-left-right-left-”

“Cap. Is that the Konami code you’re reciting right now.” You say wearily, and he grins. 

“That’s right. Human fucking cheat code.” He hesitates for a second, then nods at you, holding out his hand. “Besides, chess is dumb. I could never remember what all the little thingies could do.” You look him over, and he tries to look trustworthy, brave, heroic because - 

Oh fuck, today, Peter Capra was going to be such a goddamn hero.

“You’re an idiot.” You murmur, but before you take his hand, you hug him close, and he doesn’t hesitate, because he loves you and he’s proud of you and this is his chance to do the right thing. He hugs you back.

“It’s gonna be okay. We got this.” He assures you, and you linger for a second before letting him go. 

“Yeah. Okay. We gotta go. Running out of magic.” You take his hand again, and he grins at you, feeling this… this fucking maelstrom of power he’s about to unleash on, well… well, a really old man. Oh, that kicks ass. That is spectacular.

“Let’s go break the goddamn game.” He mutters, before the darkness drags him in.


	159. LastResort

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays, everyboy! Yes. EVERY. BOY.   
> If you're still wondering what to give me for christmas, it is a trip to my tumblr, where a tip jar is! (Any tips will go into my fund for the charity of: Trying To Buy Presents For My Family As An Unpaid Intern). If you've gotten this far, you have anything extra, and you haven't tossed anything my way before, while ABSOLUTELY not required, it would be much appreciated.
> 
> Also c'mon, this plotting? Tell me that's not worth a cup 'o coffee.
> 
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> 
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> 
> [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Well, yeah. He would. He would be like this. If anyone would be super fucking stoked to go fight the bad guy, it would be Peter Capra. 

You’re feeling a little dizzy, a lot drained, and - oh god, that countdown was still running deep in your soul, that hourglass you’d turned over as you burn the last of Gaster’s time magic. What comes next, if you run out? 

You decide not to discover. 

“Hold on tight. Get ready to do… you know. That thing you do.” You instruct, and Cap’s eyes widen. 

“What do I say?” 

Oh, fuck, right. That.

“Uh. Tell him… tell him to release us from any commands. Then to shut up and sit down and wait for… Asgore. Asgore. He’ll know what to do.” You mutter. 

“Right. Or. Uh. Should it be the other way around? Shut up then release?”

“Oh. God. Do you think… yeah, okay. Let’s do it that way. Shut up, then release. Ready?”

“Okay, you’re sure that’ll-”

“Peter.” You say quietly. “We’re running out of time.” He hesitates, then swallows and nods. “Lessgo.” You say, and the two of you plunge into the blackness once more. 

You find the time you need to go to with no difficulty, no difficulty at all. Part of your soul has been calling you back to this moment for your entire foray through time with Capra - you mustn’t forget, you _can’t_ forget that you need to make your way back there, need to go over to Sans. That frozen slice of time is crystalized in your mind, and part of you _yearns_ , actually fucking _yearns_ to be there, to complete your task…

(3… 2… 1…) You warn Capra.

(Let’s fuck some shit up.) He replies grimly, trying to hide the undercurrent of glee in his soul at the prospect, and then -

-pop- 

You’re on the grass, on the cliff, and you need to go to Sans and-

“Don’t say another-” That’s Cap, next to you, already barking out the command but-

“ **Jump.** ” Dennis forces the thought out first, and then it’s just one long moment where everything seems frozen, then Sans lets out a bellow, turning to look at you, but he’s already toppling over the edge and-

“-goddamn word, you fuck!’ Capra finishes, and Dennis turns to look at him, eyebrows raised, amused for a second, before he opens his mouth, then suddenly looks astonished -

(Sans has fallen off the cliff and he’s dead, or seriously hurt, or…)

“Cap!” You bark out, already inching closer to the cliffside, to the spot where Sans had disappeared. “Sans!” Capra whirls his head around, looking for the place you’d told him Sans would be, and his eyes widen, seeing you creep closer. 

You have to go to Sans.

“Shit! Fuck! Hold still!” He barks.

You immediately freeze in your tracks. Dennis, quietly, begins to laugh, his eyes wide with mirth. 

“He’s dead.” You say numbly. “He’s dead.” 

“Fuck!” Capra repeats, then swivels to look at Dennis. “Sit down.” Dennis sits. “Do not move… agh, ______, my brain hurts, I can’t keep all of these going at once, he’s pushing back, fuck, fuck-”

“Concentrate!” You demand. Capra goes silent, staring at Dennis, and Dennis grins back up from his crosslegged seat on the grass. Mocking you. 

“I… need… help…” 

Sans had fallen over the edge of the cliff. Sans was dead. 

Sans was dead. Sans was dead.

Dennis smiles peacefully. He knows Cap can’t last forever. 

That was how people you loved died. They fell off of fucking cliffs - this one guy, this one goddamn guy, he threw them off cliffs and they died.

“Cap.” You say quietly. “Let me move again. Tell me to come over to you.” 

“Fuck…” He says pitifully, still sweating. “I can’t _hold_ another one-”

“Do it.” You don’t have room in your heart to find mercy for him right now, even as he struggles under the weight of magics he doesn’t know how to wield-

“Okay. Okay. C… come here!” He forces out through gritted teeth, and you let your sudden, unbridled fury carry you over to the two of them. 

Dennis grins up at you, and you can see the Capra family resemblance now, you know that smile, those eyes, that cocky demeanor and he laughs at you. He can’t say another word, but he’s suddenly all giggles.

“Fuck.” Capra suddenly groans again, grabbing his temples, and you snap. You aren’t going to give this asshole the opportunity to hurt another person you love. 

You look into him and you see a soul that is colorless, a soul that is all mirror, mercury, swirling lazily and calmly like an oil slick only slightly disturbed. You look into that soul, and you see yourself reflected in that beautiful ugliness, and for a moment, you want to be beautifully, beautifully ugly. You’re done being the hero, doing the right thing, watching people die because you refused to explore your power. It was your turn. 

Your arm snaps out, and you leech.

For a second, his face is pure confusion, then horror, abject horror as his power, his soul begins to slide into you, slippery and unctuous and lingering, like cheap truffle oil, something supposedly refined that you can’t help but feel is rancid, and yet - 

And yet, you want more -

“Fuck!” Capra gasps, seemingly in relief (you’ve heard every variation of “fuck” from that man’s mouth, and you’re fairly confident this is a positive one). You smile to yourself, and pull harder, pull that power into you as the edifice of Dennis Smith begins to crumble-

(flashes of his life, flashes of horrors, faces of people he’d wronged, some strangers, some familiar, blood and bruises and fury and chaos, all filing into you, all downloading, compressed, a magical zipfile, oh, oh this hadn’t happened before, but this time, this time you were playing to kill, this time you were taking it all)

“Kid.” Capra’s saying, staring at you. “Kid. That’s enough.”

“HE KILLED HIM!” You snarl, pulling harder still at that magic, stripping him clean and watching as the Dorian Gray you have in front of you begins to resemble the portrait in the attic more and more - he’s aging years, decades, so rapidly. Wrinkles, hair receding, a tooth drops to the ground as he screams noiselessly-

“Stop it.” Capra commands, and you realize suddenly, oh you could fight it, you could make him sorry for trying to tell you what to do, but…

You stop.  
You trust him. 

Besides, you’ve already done enough. A feeble looking, ancient man squints up at you through rheumy eyes as you gasp, nearly winded.

“You were going to kill him.” Cap says flatly, but you know him too well for that. He’s spooked. 

“He. Killed. Sans.” You gasp. “My fiance. Tomorrow, he was going to be my husband, and he killed him. He killed the father of my child, he-”

Wait.

“What?!” Capra demands, when you’re still standing there, blinking, just a moment later. 

“I…” You begin, then trail off. The thing was that he hadn’t killed Sans! Not unless Dot was lying to you, but, well, Dot hadn’t been lying to you, because in that future, in your house, seventeen years from now it still smelled like him, because just being there you had sensed him all around… he’d been in your future, so he couldn’t have died just now, which means-

“Oh for fuck’s sake, WHAT?!” Capra bellows. 

“We missed something.” You whisper. “We save him. There’s something we still have to do to save him.” Dennis begins to hiss, wheezing, ancient laughter, and you turn to him. “Shut up. No noises. Think about what you’ve done.” You snap, then, to add insult to injury, you add, “And feel remorse, you fucking sociopath.” 

Dennis’ eyes once again widen as the horror of this command sinks in. You look at him disdainfully for a second, then turn back to Capra. “How do we stop a man who’s fallen off a cliff from getting hurt?”

“Bigass trampoline?” Capra suggests.

“Are you fucking kidding me right now.” You say flatly, and he groans. 

“I dunno. Can we just go look and see how we did it-”

“NO.” You say suddenly. “Whatever we see there becomes fixed. Right now, all I know is that he survives. So we just need to find ONE solution.” When Capra gives you a look, you squirm slightly. “I, uh… went to the future.” 

“...Of course you did. Did I - no, you know what, I don’t want to know.” He says slowly. “I mean, uh. If I was pushed off a cliff? I’d just use my badass forcefield shoes, but… Sans doesn’t have a pair, only you and me. And, uh, how would we get them on him in midair in the first place?”

The idea solidifies in your head all at once.

“He’d have to be wearing them first.” You mutter, checking inside you once more. Woah, okay, that is a ton - a _metric fuckton_ of Dennis power you’d need to get rid of at some point, but there, still inside you, the last dregs of Gaster’s power, less than a quarter left now, a fraction of what you’d started with… it would have to do.

“Be right back.” You tell Capra, and nod at Dennis. “Watch him.” 

“Where are you-” You hear him begin, but it’s too late, you’re gone, flinging yourself into the darkness once more. This time you barely spend a minute in that black place, because you’re flying with perfect precision now, because you have to be fast, because your opportunity is running out.   
You come rocketing out onto the cliff - the same cliff, the same goddamn place, still sunny, still bright, but it’s - oh, today, this day you’ve come out on, it’s almost exactly two years ago.

You stare up at the curved surface of the barrier, glowing white and pure and seductive and blocking off the cave that leads into the palace below, and you hesitate only for a second.

The barrier had fallen at 2:23 PM.

You’d given yourself three minutes to pull this off.

You approach the barrier, arm outstretched, braced, but you’re still not ready - NOBODY could be ready for that power that immediately soaks into you, pure and distilled and clean

(you understand, now, how this had turned Capra into an asshole, you touched this stuff and you felt like an absolute god…)

You keep walking. Step by little step, you force yourself to push through the semipermeable barrier, to emerge, near blinded, on the other side, where…

Where Frisk is talking quietly to a small goat monster. 

Neither of them notice you. They’re absorbed in conversation, queued entirely in on each other, but behind them, strewn over the cavern like casualties in a war: Asgore, Toriel, Undyne, Alphys, Papyrus and… propped up against a wall, stirring slightly, there’s Sans. 

He locks eyes with you, and a slow, bemused smile crosses his face, and you spring into action. 

“Ignore me.” You tell Frisk and Asriel, immediately and guiltlessly taking advantage of the power you’d stolen from Dennis. Sans arches an eyebrow at that, sitting up, and you immediately turn to the rest of your friends - the people you loved so much (and Asgore). “Sleep.” You breathe. They oblige.

Sans is wearing pink fuzzy slippers. 

You slide them off him at once, then hurriedly unlace your own shoes, forcing them loosely onto his feet - no time to tie them. “Forget you ever saw me here.” You murmur, looking at his closed eye sockets and hoping. “When you wake up, I was never here. Don’t question the sneakers. You just picked them up somewhere. You like them now. They’re your favorite.” You instruct quickly. “And Sans? When you find yourself falling off a cliff in about two years? Click your heels on the way down.” You glance over your shoulder. Frisk is still talking to the little goat, but as you look at him, the goat monster fades away into nothingness, and suddenly, Frisk seems to be upset and disoriented, “Sleep!” You hiss, and Frisk, too, drops to the ground.

Quickly, you position yourself behind a boulder, hidden away. One minute left to go.

“Wake up.” You tell everyone. 

A minute later, the barrier has come crashing down, and you want - oh, god, you want to watch him see the sun, but time’s almost out, your magic is almost out!

You sling yourself back through time, this time choosing your destination as the bottom of the cliff.

You can spot your destination from the small crater and the cloud of dust. You hurry over at once, panicked. 

Inside a shimmering, egg shaped bubble, a bewildered looking skeleton grins weakly at you.

“knew you could pull it off.” He whispers proudly. His eyes sweep, barely hesitating, from the baby’s soul to the shimmering, metallic core of your own. “what happened?”

“It is…” You begin slowly. “A… super. Long. Story.”


	160. Wherein It's Over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back, boys and ghouls! I hope you had a good vacation! I sure as hell did. Though, like... the story's totally over or whatever, so like, it's fine.   
> I mean, just look at that chapter title. It's clearly over. 
> 
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Three hours later, Sans is cutting a door home, and you are just ready to _pass the fuck out_.

Sans is fine, if not a little shaken and more than a little overwhelmed when he finally gets the story out of you; it’s a tale you know you’ll have to tell over and over again to your friends, loved ones, the government probably... but you started the process with Sans, Capra, and Asgore.  
Asgore had been a necessity, of course, because you’d needed to put the husk of a man that had once been Dennis Smith somewhere, and, well, Asgore had the facilities. So, with Dennis under very close watch, his power still tucked away inside you, almost overwhelming still with its sheer potential, you’d found Asgore, and you’d explained what you’d just been through. Thoroughly. With a great deal of questioning from Sans, and Capra in addition to Asgore.

You were _exhausted_.

“Well, yes, of course we’ll hold him…” Asgore had finally said, looking at Dennis with clear discomfort - he looked impossibly aged (he _was_ impossibly aged), withered beyond recognition. He wasn’t making eye contact with anyone, not that he likely could through his cloudy eyes, but he was busy elsewhere, slackjawed and horrified as your command resonated with him. He was digging through centuries of monstrous conduct, and, perhaps for the first time ever, he was feeling remorse. 

A steady stream of tears was coursing down his face as two Knight Knights hauled him away, down a hall that you knew led to that same cell that had housed Gaster, then-

“Fuck, I forgot about Cody.” You’d whispered to Sans.

“he’ll be ok.” He reassured you. “whatever hold dennis had on him is broken now. asshole’s out of magic.” 

This made sense, but still feeling a little anxious, you hoped he was right. Poor Cody. Poor Capra, who still looked a bit drawn and shaken from his battle of wills with Dennis. Poor Sans. Poor you. So many people had suffered because of this one man. 

Sans had eyed you, then turned to Asgore and Capra. “she’s gotta go home. we can do this later.” He’d demanded. Asgore’s eyes had grown wide and he’d nodded at once. 

“Yes. Of course. We can resume tomorrow-”

“Not tomorrow.” You’d grumbled, and Asgore’s massive head had swivelled to look at you. “We’re getting married tomorrow.” 

“Oh!” Asgore had exclaimed, and then he sucked a breath in and said, trying to be tactful, “Er, don’t you think, under the circumstances-”

“we’re getting married tomorrow.” Sans had said firmly. “goin’ home now. hey, cap, you good to come home?”

“Oh, yeah, let’s... “ Several things seemed to occur to Capra at the same time, because suddenly, he was glancing himself over. “Fuck, uh, do I look okay, am I-”

“Oh, god, he’ll just be happy to have you home.” You’d sighed, giving him an exhausted smile as you leaned against Sans.

And now Sans was cutting a doorway, and on the other side was your foyer - you’d been in your house so often today, but now was the right time, the right place. 

Everything was finally okay. 

You took Sans’ hand, and, just for today, you did one final impossibility, one final jump through space, and you stepped home.  
\----------------------------------

He watches you step through the hole in the universe, and he trades one last anxious glance with Asgore - well, _his_ glance was anxious, because he was fucking anxious, Asgore just looked old and kingly and uh, goatly and inscrutable, and...

Get your shit together, Peter. 

He rubs his eyes, pulls together a semblance of self confidence, and he follows you and Sans home.

As the doorway seals up behind the three of you, he glances around and then snorts. Sans, already preoccupied with trying to guide you, presumably, up to bed, turns to him and cocks his skull questioningly. 

“wha’s so funny?”

“Heh.” He says, then shrugs. “I dunno. We did this whole damn thing. I went on a fucking space-time adventure, you know? But for him, it’s like I’m just rolling up like, hey, it’s fixed, what’s up? Like, he’s not gonna care-”

“Cap, you dumbass. You’ve been gone for _weeks._ ” You laugh. “Go find-” You cut yourself off, looking over his shoulder, paused in your ascent of the staircase. He knows what’s up. He’s seen movies. He’ll turn around and Mettaton will be right behind him. 

He turns around. 

And… yeah. 

“You’re back…” Mettaton’s voice betrays absolutely nothing. Mettaton is never _this_ robotic, but right now - oh, fuck, fucking hell, none of the moving bits on the guy are moving, he’s just looking blankly at Peter, just him and that expression that gives away nothing and that faint hum of processors, of motors whirring, exhaust cooling, of, somewhere deep in there, an incorporeal being manifesting his emotions in a body that is perfectly and exactly built to be a representation of who he wishes to be, and he’s so fucking beautiful, he’s so fucking beautiful that he hurts, it hurts to look at him-

“I’m back.” He says weakly, raising a half hearted hand in a wave, then gulps in a breath. “Threep, I’m so sorry, I have so much to tell you, I didn’t mean to - okay, how do I put this, I don’t even know where to start, I mean, I had to go, I had to save her and the baby and Sans and technically like, you and me, I just - I, I-”

“I don’t care.” Mettaton says, and steps forward, grabbing Peter so tightly that it hurts, but like the beauty, like all of this, it’s a good hurt, oh god, it’s a good, good hurt. 

He hugs him right back, and his fingers grip on cool metal, into silken, artificially soft hair, and he’s _home._

“Did you save the world?” Mettaton asks, several minutes later, breaking the silence of that period of time where they’re just holding each other, breathing, refusing to let go. He’s got Mettaton in his arms again, and everything is perfect and he doesn’t want to think much harder than that. He’s got Mettaton. He’s okay. 

“I think so.” He replies quietly, then gulps, “Threep, I never made you love me. I figured it out. I can prove it, even, if you want, I never-”

“I know.” Mettaton laughs, a little tired, a little sad.

“Don’t you want me to-” Mettaton stops him with another squeeze.

“Peter. I am awfully old, and I know myself better than.. well, than most people.” He says slowly. “I know when something is real.”

Oh. 

“I’m sorry.” He whispers, and Mettaton shakes his head. 

“Don’t be. You did what you needed to do. You’re a hero.”

“Hah, you don’t even know what I did-”

“Yes, but I know you.” Mettaton laughs, and finally pulls back to kiss him, very, very softly. “Just… next time?”

“Don’t leave, I know, I should have-”

“No!” Mettaton says, startled. “Next time, take me with you! God, the trouble I can only assume you got into-”

“Oh god, please don’t let there be a next time.” He interrupts, inching away.

“damn straight.” The voice is unexpected, and thoroughly unpleasant for him right now. He and Mettaton both whirl to look at you and Sans… still on the stairs.

“What the fuck!?” He exclaims, indignant. “Have you just stayed there watching the whole damn time?!”

“...’s our house too.” Sans says with a lazy shrug. 

“I mean… we’ve been listening to the two of you be all upset because you weren’t together _forever!_ ” You add. “We totally get to see this bit! Come on, I’ve had a ridiculous day, I deserve some resolution!” He’d almost feel sorry for you if it weren’t for the fact that you and Sans have nearly identical smirks. 

“Oh… come on!” He exclaims, throwing his hands up in the air, then almost immediately replacing them because it feels wrong, not touching Mettaton right now. “C’mon, Threep. Let’s go somewhere private.”

“Er. Yes. Please.” Mettaton says, though even he sounds a little amused. 

“so, like, you guys back together, or….” Sans calls after the two of them. 

Capra doesn’t deign to respond. He just flips Sans off behind his back with his free hand. 

The other hand is twined together with Mettaton’s, and he doesn’t really care about Sans, not really. 

He’s home. 

He’s home.

“I love you, Mettaton.” He breathes, before the door to their bedroom shuts. 

“I know.” Mettaton says, a spark in his eye that lets Peter know that, yes, Mettaton has seen Star Wars at last, Mettaton knows exactly what he’s doing and - oh, fuck, he loves him for it even more. “I love you, Peter.” 

He takes a big breath, swallows, then grins.

“I know.” 

\---------------------------------------

After watching all that, Sans insists that you go upstairs, and it’s true, you’re on your last legs. 

“you’re amazing.” He says, marveling as he kicks off the shoes that had saved his life. “holy shit. these don’t even make sense.” 

“Hm?” You ask, pulling the covers up to your chin, already beyond ready to sleep. Your eyelids are drooping, and you just don’t know how you’re going to make it much longer. Oh god, normally you wouldn’t be sleeping! The wedding’s tomorrow, and there’s still so much… so much to do…

You yawn.

“the shoes. cap built them because he was jealous of my shoes. but they are my shoes. they’re based on themselves. does that make sense?” His browbone furrows, and then he groans, shrugs, and climbs in bed, clinging to you. You’re not surprised by this. You’re clinging right back. For a moment, the two of you just clutch at each other in silence, just like Capra and Mettaton had. Sans is the one who breaks the silence. “hey. we did it.” He whispers. 

“Hmmm?” You yawn, nuzzling closer to him. 

“we survived.” 

“Fuck yeah we did.” You laugh sleepily, sighing as his hand moves to your belly. “Sans, our girl. She’s…”

“i can’t wait.” He murmurs. “i can’t wait to meet her.” 

“I think you’re going to have to.” You laugh-yawn. “I used almost all of that time magic up. I have enough left for… _maybe_ one more trip. A super short one. And I think I need to save that for an emergency.” 

“good.” He whispers. “me, i like my time movin’ forward.” 

“Me too. Mostly.” You yawn, your eyes closed, tucking your head under his chin. 

“that other magic, though. the dennis shit-”

“As soon as I can figure out how to get rid of it, I will. It feels…. terrible, actually. I’m trying not to poke at it.” You say, cracking open an eyelid. It’s true, that silvery magic is just sitting, heavy and powerful and _wrong_ in your chest, and you know, you know in your heart that it’s not good for you. “Maybe once I wake up. I don’t want to feel like this at our wedding.” 

“yeah.” He whispers, then starts, “uh. you really, really sure you’re ready-”

“Sans. I refuse to let _anything_ else mess this up.” You interject quickly, then smile at him. “It’ll be okay, babe.” You reassure him.

“yeah. you’re right. yeah. it’ll be perfect.” He mutters. “it’s over, after all, right?”

“Right.” You say firmly. “It’s over.” 

It’s over, you tell yourself, your eyes closing. Already, you can feel your consciousness going hazy around the edges. What’s reality, what’s dream, it’s blurring so fast. 

It’s over, you convince yourself. 

It’s over.

It’s over. 

You think you smell something coppery and familiar.

You think you smell chocolate.


	161. Wherein There Is A Regular Wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)  
>  [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

The next morning, you’ve entirely forgotten about any weird smells that you may or may not have, er, smelt yesterday. After all. This is the big show. This is the day. You’re getting married.

Also, you’ve slept like…

“somethin’ like eighteen hours.” Sans says, sounding sleepy himself when you finally open your eyes. You open your mouth, startled, then pout when he begins to snicker. 

“Well, I was _tired!_ ”

“well, you had a good reason.” He says, his grin growing more gentle. “you did it, babe. you saved the day. saved _my_ bony ass.” 

“Yeah I did.” You say, just a little bit proud of yourself, and then jump as a tiny flutter inside you informs you that, “Dot just woke up too.” Sans grins at that. 

“know what’s good?” 

“What’s good?” You reply, arching an eyebrow. 

“well, uh, we know we make it another something-teen years. we know she does too.” He says brightly, and you laugh, nodding.

“Yeah. I suppose you’re right. I mean, I’m not gonna like stand in traffic to see if that makes me invincible or anything… I mean, what if I _do_ manage to die? Would that like destroy the universe or-”

“easy. don’t die.” He says with an eyeroll, then looks at you again. “seriously, uh, don’t. don’t stand in traffic either. not really safe.”

“I’ll do my best.” You yawn, then cock your head, sitting up in bed. “Hey. We’re getting married today.” It hardly seems real. After the chaos of yesterday, after all the revelations… suddenly, this sinks in. “Oh. Oh shit. Sans. We’re getting married today! We had all sorts of shit to do yesterday and it didn’t get done and your bachelor party and my thingy and and…. oh, fuck, we’re getting married today.” You repeat, your eyes going wide.

He grins placidly up at you, then grabs your hand, tugging you down for a proper kiss, not caring about your morning breath, not caring about anything but you, here, in this moment.

“yeah we are.” He finally breathes. 

\------------------------------------------------------

There’s no _space_ for you to get ready at the cliffside - the same damn place your husband-to-be had nearly died at just yesterday! - so hasty arrangements are made. You could have technically gotten ready underground, but well, you don’t want to go back underground just now, exactly. You don’t really want to go back to the cliff side either, but… fuck, everything will be all set up, so you just resolve to think about it as the site of a victory rather than a nightmare. 

Undyne’s picked up your wedding dress, so you end up cutting a door to Toriel’s cottage to get ready, after one last fleeting kiss with Sans. Undyne and Alphys go with you, looking at you with those big, huge eyes of utter admiration that make you wonder if, like, Capra hadn’t embellished the story a little yesterday. You’d have to find out how much he had told them, eventually, because well… he might or might not have informed Undyne that she had been used as Dennis’ personal magic bloodbank and, if he hadn’t, you’d have to figure out how to do that tactfully…

But like… 

Tomorrow. 

You’d worry about all that stuff tomorrow, because today was wedding day and _oh shit this was actually happening_ -

“My dear!” Toriel exclaims when she sees you, wrapping you very tightly in a hug, and then there’s a second little thwump as Frisk flings themselves at you, adhering to your leg in a way that reminds you inexorably of how the octopus at the aquarium sucks itself onto the glass. “The King told me of what you went through yesterday…” She murmurs, stroking your hair as she refuses to release you. “You brave dear. You brave, brave woman.”

“I kind of had to-” You mumble, muffled by the way that your face is being pressed into, well, goat boobs.

**You were _brave._** Frisk insists, and even once Toriel releases you, they remain, clinging to your leg and looking up at you in utter adoration. 

“Heh. I tried.” You demurr, thinking of the threat Dennis had posed to Frisk and suddenly feeling quite ill. What kind of monster would be fine, just _fine_ with hurting kids or taking advantage of them or-

“Hey, don’t close that door.” Undyne barks, seeing you absently raising your hand to seal your shortcut behind you. “We need Mettaton for makeup.” 

“L-l-like we’ll get him out of P-p-peter’s room… oh, umm…” Alphys trails off, blushing, as Frisk looks curiously at her and Toriel raises an eyebrow. 

“Oh, I’ll get him.” Undyne says grimly, cracking her knuckles. “I gotta get Nat too. ________, pal, ya wanna keep that open and then we’ll pop in on Nat-”

“She needs to get into her dress!” Toriel insists.

“I need a drink.” You mutter quietly to nobody.

“Y-you can’t _have_ a drink, the b-baby will-”

“I knowwwwwww.” You groan, slumping to a seat in Toriel’s cozy armchair and wishing you could just be back in bed with Sans. The rest of the room goes quiet as Undyne, Alphys and Toriel take you in, and Frisk crawls quietly onto your lap. 

“Uhhhh. We got this. See you in a few.” Undyne says with an air of finality, and ducks through your portal, which you shut - it takes effort to keep the big ones open, and right now you think you need all the energy that you have. Frisk gives you an encouraging hug, and Alphys tentatively raises the bag with your dress in it.

“Um. R-ready?”

You know you live through this. It’ll be okay.   
\---------------------------------------------------------

Three hours later, you might actually be ready. You’re in your dress, trying out your pockets - oh, god, you love that this dress has pockets - and arguing with Toriel that you will absolutely not be trading nicer shoes for the sneakers that you’d stolen back from Sans - or, well, that Sans had insisted that you take back, because “uh, i’m not gettin’ anywhere near that goddamn cliff ever again. these are yours.” He wasn’t exactly wrong. These were good good sneakers, and well, he already had dress shoes and also he wasn’t pregnant. And these were comfy. So… there, Tori. 

“But, my dear, perhaps you would just-”

“Let it go, darling.” Mettaton advises her, resting his hand knowingly on her forearm. “Those are…” He hesitates, then flashes a dazzling grin at you. “Wonderful shoes.” He says. He looks so perfectly, blissfully happy right now. You’d always figured that _you_ would be the person that happy on your wedding day - and well, you are. Or, you will be. Later. Once all the things you’re worrying about have fallen into place and you can just dance your butt off. 

“Her face looks pretty good too.” Nat chirps. Undyne had apparently had a very good time driving her and Mettaton around in your barely used convertible, with the logic that, yo, you couldn’t just TELEPORT into your wedding, you had to make an entrance!

Well… the convertible with the skull on the hood would certainly do that. You hadn’t fought her. It was, after all, kind of funny. 

“Pretty good?!” Mettaton’s sweet mood wobbles at the lack of effusiveness in that compliment. 

**She looks super pretty!** Frisk insists. 

“You look pretty good yourself, squirt.” You laugh. Frisk had changed into their (rather sharp) three piece suit without too much complaint, though they absolutely refused Nat’s efforts to get their hair out of their eyes. 

“Eh. They’ve looked better.” Undyne teases. Matching bridesmaids dresses clearly wasn’t happening - Undyne was wearing a dress that somehow featured spiked epaulets, Alphys was wearing something with a lot of ribbons and bows and a spectacular sunhat, and Nat - well, Nat’s dress looked normal at first glance, if a little... country, but she’d eventually admitted that she’d originally bought it for a formal femme-McCree cosplay, which kind of raised more questions than it answered…

At least Toriel looked radiant and wise in her robes of deep, plush violet, and Mettaton - well, Mettaton always looked great. You all did one last check to make sure nothing was forgotten, and then piled in the car, which was definitely not intended for so many people. 

It wasn’t elegant, but hell… it WAS an entrance. 

Asgore had actually helped out, and found a big field to park in at the base of the mountain. From there you could either walk up a winding, decorated trail covered in ribbons and lace and floating fairy lanterns - thanks, Muffet and Whimsun! - or be escorted up by a magical…

“Is that a duck?” You ask Undyne, mystified. 

“Don’t worry about it.” She scoffs.

“Okay, well, if I walk up that trail, knowing my luck, I will almost certainly fall down and/or get muddy or something and also I’m preeeegnant and my bacccckkk hurts so I’mjustgonnagoupthere-”

“But all the decorations!” Toriel cries.

“But the dramatic value!” Mettaton protests.

“Uh. I’m with her. Hill, robot knees, no bueno.” Nat says dryly, and Undyne sighs. 

“Fine. We’ll see you up there.” You’re cutting a hole up to the cliff side when Frisk tugs your skirt. 

**Can I go with you?** You glance at Toriel who shrugs, then nods. 

“Okay. Let’s roll.” You finish making the shortcut and step out onto an almost unrecognizable cliffside.

Yesterday, this had been a place of stark and severe natural beauty, but today, oh, there were chairs, and a little dais with an altar, and so many, so many flowers. It smells heavenly and-

“woah…” 

You turn, and blink at Sans, who’s standing there with Capra, Shadow and Papyrus. He looks… well, holy shit, you hadn’t known it could really, really be done, but Capra’s tailor had clearly find a way to make even something as formal as a tux look good on Sans. All of the groomsmen, to be fair, are spectacularly neatly dressed, even-

“BROTHER! YOU AREN’T SUPPOSED TO SEE HER! THAT’S VERY LIKELY SOME SORT OF CURSE OR SOMETHING!” You roll your eyes. 

“I’m sure it’s fine, Papyrus. You look very handsome, by the way. All you boys do. Boys and Capra-”

“I’m _not_ that old, and-” Cap begins, but Sans interrupts.

“you look…” He’s lost for words. He sounds a little choked up.

“...GOOD.” Papyrus prompts his brother helpfully. “PRETTY? NICE? PRETTY NICE-”

“perfect.” Sans decides, then laughs, walking towards you, and..

The ground rumbles beneath your feet. 

Immediately, you lock eyes with Sans, crossing to each other within seconds and looking around, wild eyed. Yesterday, the world had begun to unravel and it had felt like-

“Jeez, another earthquake?” Nat mutters.

The ground stops shaking, and you and Sans hesitate, prepared for the worst.

Nothing happens. 

“Huh. Well… let’s hope that’s it for the day, guys, because you know, like, Ebott is an active volcano and also Sans cursed us.” Capra says casually, and then, when everyone turns to glare at him, he shrugs. “Well, he _did…_ ”

“I feel dizzy.” You murmur. You can’t help but think… are you missing something? It feels like you’re missing something.

“dennis?” Sans whispers, just loud enough that you can hear him. You grimace, then look at him. 

“He’s um, he’s in the cells. We could check. Really fast. Just. You know. So we don’t worry during the wedding.” 

“i mean, i’m not worried…” Sans says, very unconvincingly. 

“Neither am I.” You lie right back at him,and then both of you share a very nervous giggle, before you turn to the rest of the group. “We’re… we’re gonna go check on something. Be right back.” You lock eyes with Nat. “Keep an eye on Frisk?” 

“Uh. Sure.” She says, and blinks as you and Sans head, at once, towards the cave entrance leading to the underground. 

(“DON’T MIND THEM, THEY’RE JUST HEADING OFF TO KISS, THEY DO THIS ALL THE TIME.” Papyrus says knowledgeably as you leave.)

“we’re just going to check.” Sans tells himself. 

“Right.” You agree, and without any further words, you reach out and grab his bony hand in your own skeletal appendage. He grips you tightly, and your stomach lurches as the ground beneath your feet rumbles slightly again.

“you ok-”

“Yeah. Yeah. Just dizzy. Be ready… if we need to bail-”

“got it.” He mutters. 

The two of you know the way to the cells by heart now, and you hurry down the stairs to the room Dennis is being stored in without any obstruction - which, in itself, probably isn’t great.

“king’s gotta get better guards” Sans grimaces, his grip on your hand tighter, as you turn the corner and open the door that leads to the hallway holding Dennis’ cell. 

Dennis sits in the corner of the cell, cloudy eyes wide, mouth open. He makes a soft noise, a groan that it takes you several seconds to realize is more than a groan - it’s words.

“..eyyyyy...eaaahhhh.” He rasps, forcing air through his toothless mouth.

“what?!” Sans demands, and Dennis stirs slightly.

“heeeeyyyy ….heeeaaahhh,” He manages this time, and you sway slightly - still dizzy. Sans looks concernedly at you, and you shake your head, just as a tiny voice becomes possible. 

“Please… p-please, don’t make me-”

**NOW.**

You have time for one flash of memory - of being in this room, of a little yellow flower in the corner, in the crack, right where Dennis is sitting, before-

A huge, thorny, thrashing green mass of vines suddenly erupts out of the ground, beneath Dennis - no, oh god, _through_ Dennis, and with a sickening sound and an even worse smell, Dennis Smith ends his time on this earth.

There is a noise from beneath the vines, from under the ground. It sounds like sobbing. 

There is a voice behind you.   
**Good start.** They breathe. 

You realize what Dennis had been trying to say a second too late. 

“They’re here.”


	162. Reunited

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
> [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)  
>  [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“oh… oh god…” Sans mutters, staring into the cell, as you whirl, trying to find the voice behind you. “he just… oh. god.”

“Did you hear that?” You interject, eyes wide, searching, searching for-

**Oh, he won’t.** The voice says dismissively. **Not unless I want him to. And right now, I don’t. I’ve heard enough moralizing from _him_ for a thousand lifetimes.**

“C-chara… please…” The twisting mass of vines behind you in the cell shifts, grows - thankfully, concealing the gruesome remnants of Dennis Smith. “I… I don’t want to-”

“what’s goin’ on?” Sans interjects, clutching your hand so tight it hurts. “i can’t-”

**Oh. Is this really necessary? Fine.** The high, childlike voice groans, and then, for a second, it feels like all the light drains out of the room- like all the power, the life is gone and it’s so dark - and then something snaps and…

It takes a second for your eyes to focus on the small child leaning against the bars of the cell as you search the room, but then, there they are. 

They are tiny, really - you can at last take them in, all at once. Too small, all scuffed knees and a worn sweater and two eyes that are brighter, redder than is proper, than is natural - not that any of this is natural. 

(They look so much like Frisk, you think distractedly.)

“wait.” Sans is saying, and you tear your eyes away from the little child-who-is-not-a-child to focus on Sans. His browbone is furrowed, and his jaw is clenched, and he looks like something is just on the tip of his tongue. “i… i know you. i think. i think… i… god.” As he speaks, he inches closer to you, defensively, and his eyes dart down to Chara’s empty hand. 

“You and I are very old friends.” Chara whispers, and their eyes flash bright red for a moment, their entire eye, not just the iris, and they smile. It is not a friendly smile. “I suppose I was a little rough with you, for a friend. I was just so curious when you and your brother showed up on the scene. After all. You’re what I should have gotten to be. You’re _lucky_.”

There is a long, painful pause, and then; “whaddya mean?” Sans snorts, suddenly looking almost relaxed. You know him, though, and you know that he’s doing this because that’s what he does when his mind is moving a thousand miles per hour, when all that matters is making sure that whatever he’s facing thinks he’s calm, because inside him, a hurricane is building.

“Sans.” Chara sighs. “So smart. So clever. All your science and research, all your books and machines, even Doctor Gaster as a mentor and you never. Even. Got. Close.”

“What?” It’s your turn. Your eyes are trained on the cell, that twisting (softly sobbing) mass of vines - and you’re reaching inside yourself, testing, thinking - can you Pause? Can you-

Something registers. The liquid metallic magic of Dennis’ soul is missing.

Casting your gaze back towards Chara, you search for a hint, for a soul, but there is no soul, there is nothing but stolen silver energy, and your stomach twists.

“And now here the two of you are. My cousin and my old friend... expecting. Didn’t you ever wonder how that could be? Didn’t it ever seem strange to you that you two were the exception to the rule, that you could… interbreed? A human and a monster?” Hearing the inflection, the vocabulary, the clear diction from this tiny child’s mouth, high and sweet and nearly innocent, it chills you to the bone. 

“Of… of course….” You mutter, trying - as per goddamn usual - to figure out what’s going on before the bad thing starts to happen. The bad thing happens so much these days! You grit your teeth, a thought occurring to you - you are going to HAVE this goddamn wedding, which means that you are going to STOP whatever fuckery this is, and then you and Sans are going on a goddamned HONEYMOON where stuff like this just doesn’t HAPPEN-

“Never really touched the obvious solution, though, did you?” Chara says quietly, looking first at Sans, then at you. “Look at your arm. It looks just like his. Does that make you a monster, though?”

“of course she’s not-”

“Then _why would you assume he’s a monster?!_ ” Chara hisses. You hesitate, then can’t help it. You turn to Sans, blinking. He looks back at you, similarly bewildered. “Let me tell you a story.” Chara says quietly, and they flash another enormous, cloyingly sweet smile. “Once upon a time, there was a man. His name was Dennis Smith.” They turn, and shrug at the cell. “He was…” They say slowly, turning back to face you. “He was a very bad man.”

You stare at the cell, and the blood pooling in the twisting column of vines, the only thing left of Dennis, and you feel your hairs raising, skin rippling in goosebumps.

You begin to realize that you’d only been seeing half the picture. 

“Dennis loved one thing.” Chara continues. “Power. And so he didn’t like it, one bit, that other mages made their way to Ebott. He didn’t like it, knowing that his power might ever be taken away or challenged or interrupted. So he did… experiments.” They push themselves off the bars of the jail cell and pace forward, so little, so innocent looking, with a smile like poisoned chocolate, with a smile like a knife.

“Once upon a time, there was a mage and her husband. She was nothing special. She could move rocks and trees and people. Brute force magic. He, well, he could do nothing at all, except to love. And they did love. They loved each other, and they had sons that they loved very much. Sons who were much too young to regulate their magic. They were drawn to the power coming from the barrier, and their gifts awakened when they touched the surface.” Chara murmurs. Sans, next to you, stiffens.

“They drew his attention. Dennis used the mother and father until they were no more use to him, and then he destroyed them. The sons… well. He liked to experiment. He had built a device, you see. A device that could open up the space between spaces, a space that stripped humans down to the bone, that drove them to madness first. Yes.” They whisper. “You were human. You might be something else now, after Gaster got to work building you back up from the scraps the void had left, but… well. You didn’t suffer. Not in any way that you would remember, anyway.” They say with a shrug. “You were babies. You were _lucky._ ”

Sans is staring at Chara, his jaw hanging slightly open as he tries to process this. You’re thinking, thinking so hard your brain hurts-

“Chara.” You say quietly, and the child flinches, like hearing their name is physically painful. “You keep saying Sans was lucky. What… what happened?” Chara smiles, but their eyes look just a little unsure. You hazard a guess. “What did Dennis do to you?” You breathe. 

For the first time, the tiny child’s smile wavers.They look up at you, then take a step back, leaning against the bars of the cell again. Their eyes move from you, gaze drifting over to the thing that once was Flowey. 

“Once upon a time…” They whisper again. “There was a leech. A little vampire born into a family with no gifts to speak of, since the gift was rare, since it often skips generations. I was young, and innocent, and we were… I was sent to draw the magic from Dennis’ soul, to stop his reign of terror. I was seven.” They whisper. “I have been seven for… so terribly long.” 

“What happened-”

“I failed.” Chara spits, their eyes gleaming red again. “I failed, and for days I watched - I watched him break my mother and my father down into nothing, before he turned to me. And… do you know what he did to me?” They pause, clearly waiting for a response, their high, reedy voice quavering the way childrens’ voices sometimes do right before they cry. 

“...what did he do?” Sans asks, bracing for the answer. He seems to agree with you - this is another situation where all you can do is to keep the kid - if Chara could really be called a kid (if not, what? A ghost? A nightmare?) - well, you should keep them talking. 

“He told me he was going to let me live. He walked me to the door of his… house, if you can call a place like that a house. He opened the door, and he said ‘Go on. Run.’” Chara mutters, looking down at their feet, their scarred knees. After a moment, they look up. “I ran. I almost made it out of earshot before he called out again. Do you know what he said?” They ask, and again, wait for you and Sans to shake your heads before they whisper, “He said, ‘Do me a favor, little one. I want you to climb Mt. Ebbot. I want you to go through the barrier. And then… well, do see if you can find a way out without taking the damn barrier down. I’m curious. Chara. Find a way out. At any cost.’”

“Chara…” The mass of vines that is/was/might still be Flowey moans. “It wasn’t your fault-”

“Asriel, I am going to fix this.” Chara says, and for the first time, their voice holds the tiniest bit of sympathy. Something registers with you. Asriel. You know that name. Sans does too, because he inhales sharply, and his grasp on your hand tightens incrementally. “I know this is terrible right now. I know this hurts, but… I am going to fix this, and then it won’t matter. I know how this feels for you right now, but… it’ll be fine. I promise. I’m going to fix everything.”

“Chara, you can’t. I-”

“I can. And I will. And I must.” They turn, and look sympathetically at the mass of vines, searching it for something. “You need to trust me, my brother.” You see what Chara is looking at now - in the mess of thorns and vines (and blood) there is a tiny, tiny flower, with a tinier face - a familiar, absolutely miserable face. 

“I don’t… don’t make me hurt people. Please.” Flowey - no, _Asriel_ (how did that work?) - begs.

“You won’t have, when I’m done. This will have never have happened. I-” Chara suddenly whirls and turns to look at you and Sans - no, they are looking _past_ you and Sans. You hesitate, then turn around, looking at the doorway that you’d come through.

Frisk is there. 

(Oh, you’re going to kill Nat, she was supposed to be watching them, you think grimly)

Frisk and Chara lock eyes for a moment, and again, you are struck by the similarity between the two of them, since they could be twins. 

**Leave him alone.** Frisk breathes, their tiny fists balling up. Chara hesitates only for a second, then turns back to Flowey - shit, to Asriel - 

“Do what we discussed.” They breathe, and then they wink out of existence. 

Everyone is frozen for a second, and then Frisk runs forward, clinging to the bars of the cell and looking in at the vines as the ground begins to rumble-

**Asriel, what’s happening? What are they doing!? Why are you growing, I-**

“I have to! Frisk, I’m sorry, they told me to and I have to because they’re using magic again and, I - I - I can’t stop!” The vines, the tiny flower sob.

“kid.” Sans addresses Asriel now, his eyes wide. “what’s their plan? what ‘did we discuss?’”

“T-they’re going to… they’re going to… I can’t, I can’t-” Asriel bleats, and for a moment, his form changes, for a moment, there is a tiny goat child, a child you know and have seen before, trapped in a cage of writhing vines-

**They said it wouldn’t matter, what Asriel did. I know what that means. They’re going to RESET.** Frisk whispers. **I don’t know how to stop it. They’re going to RESET…**

You and Sans and Frisk all look at each other, and then you think of what Chara has said, and you breathe the word.

“...Everything. They’re going to make it so this all never happened. So that Dennis never hurt them. So that-”

“we don’t exist.” Sans realizes, and for a long moment, all you can do is look at each other in silent horror. “but… they can’t. it would take more energy than is even possible for one person to have, outside the barrier. they can’t. can they?!”

“Not alone.” Asriel whimpers, then cries out in apparent pain. The goat form vanishes, replaced by several sunny yellow flowers with simple, terrified faces. “I can’t…”

All three of you stare in mute horror at the column of vines. Then, abruptly, Sans turns to Frisk. “kid.” He mutters. “it’s time. you gotta… you gotta tell me what you know.” 

Frisk looks up at Sans, and a heartbeat, two heartbeats pass, and Frisk’s mouth forms that sort of stubborn, obstinate line that you know too well, and for a second, you’re nearly defeated. Then, suddenly, Frisk rushes forward and grabs Sans around the middle, hugging him tight. 

**Okay.** They whisper. **Okay.**


	163. Fallen Down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

They have had enough.

They have had enough of beatings, of bruises and blood and the stench of cheap white wine and the emptiness.

They have had enough of not being able to speak, of being cut off not just from one world but two because their mother is too bitter to teach them the signs that will give them a voice.

They have had enough with being hungry, with being hurt, with being _ignored_.

It came to them in a dream, in the middle of the night. They awoke to find themselves on the mountain, and they could - they could _remember_ this. It was as if they had done this before. 

Maybe it hadn’t been them. Maybe it had just been someone very like Frisk.

They had made it all the way up the side of Mt. Ebott without realizing it. They had climbed the security fences, had evaded detection. Nobody even knew they were here. 

Nobody, surely, knew this was here either.

They stare into the hole in the side of the mountain, the one just big enough for a six or seven year old to squeeze into, if they were small. 

Something was on the other side. They could feel it, almost calling, almost keening and they are drawn to it, but - in their memories, in that vague deja vu, they hadn’t had a choice, they had been forced to fall.

Frisk has a choice. 

They think of the silence and the reek of sweat and chardonnay and the beating that this dirty bandage is not obscuring, and they make their choice. 

They grab a stick off the ground. They might need a weapon.  
They think they hear music, which simply cannot be.

They squeeze into the hole, and then they fall.

\------------------------------------------------

He’s lying back on the cold metal of an operating table, visual processors fading in and out as he focuses on Alphys. Dear Alphys, trying so hard to get this right. Out of… friendship? No. Out of love. She loves him, and he loves her, and it’s enough to quiet the part of his soul that is just still screaming that this isn’t right, not yet, that she needs to stop fretting and talking about anime and just FIX HIM, because, well, she _is_ , he’s just impatient!

“Y-you’re sure you want to look like this, Mettaton?” She’s squeaking. “It’s j-just so… “

“Fabulous?” He prompts.

“Er. No. Um. …Human?” She says, almost guiltily, and he laughs, then. He can’t help it. Oh, he loves this new voice. 

“It isn’t human, darling, it’s just _me_.” He assures her. “This one is right. This one is what I have always, always dreamed of.”

“B-but… why?” She tries again, and he thinks about it, then tries out new processors and he shrugs.

“Oh, that feels wonderful.” He murmurs, then brushes hair - HIS hair! - out of his eye. “I can’t explain it. I can only thank you. Most people are born into the proper body, you know, but for those of us who aren’t… well… this is…” He trails off and laughs again as she begins to blush. “Besides.” He adds. “The barrier won’t stay up forever. Only one more soul, and then the King will have enough power to tear it down, and then… well, I’ll need the proper body to take the humans by storm, won’t I?”

“Um. W-what do you mean? L-like… performing for them or um, h-hurting them?” She asks nervously. He’s opening his mouth to answer when, just for a second, the lights flicker, and both of them glance at each other. “What w-was that?!” Alphys exclaims. 

He knows what it was. He remembers the last few. 

“I guess we’ll have to see.” He says, answering both questions, then tries out the shrug again. “Until then… well, Alphys, darling, I’m going to need those legs attached.” He says, and looks them over, on the table next to him. “Actually, you know, before we do... “ He gives her his most guileless grin. “Perhaps just a tiny bit more heel?” 

\------------------------------------------------

She feels it, and she begins to move. She knows where they will land. 

This time it will be different. 

This time, they will stay. 

This time it will be different. 

\-------------------------------------------

She wakes up from a dead sleep, one eye peeling open. The other one, of course, it can’t. What was that? Something is…. off. Something has just happened, enough to flood her with energy and magic and make her teeth grit, because something is happening, and she needs to be there. It’s her job to be there. She’s a protector. 

She paces outside her house, and looks around, but there’s nothing. Nothing yet. She’ll walk all the way to Snowdin and back before she convinces herself it was just in her head. 

She still can’t sleep. 

She plays the piano.

\--------------------------------------------

“bud, you gotta go to bed.”

“SANS, ONE MORE STORY?”

“...heh. ok. one more. this one’s called ‘the bro that told a billion puns-’”

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” Papyrus wails, and Sans grins. 

“thought you wanted another story?”

“NO! I WANTED A GOOD STORY! LIKE, ‘PAPYRUS AND SANS SAVE THE DAY AND IT IS MOSTLY PAPYRUS AND SANS IS JUST AN ASSISTANT!’ OR ‘PAPYRUS GETS HIS REVENGE WITH THE SUCCESSFUL CAPTURE OF ONE BILLION HUMANS AND SANS IS ALSO IN IT-’”

“how bout ‘the sleepy dog?’” Sans yawns, rolling his eyes.

“...I WILL ACCEPT A SLEEPY DOG STORY.” Papyrus determines, and pulls his blankets up to his chin. Sans is cracking open the book when something happens. They both feel it. Papyrus sits up straight, dislodging his nightcap. “SANS, WHAT WAS THAT?”

“uh… dunno. probably nothin’. come on, bedtime.” He lies.

He’s not sure, but he has a pretty good guess. 

Now he needs to figure out what he’s going to do.

 

\--------------------------------------------

He feels it, and he doesn’t even stand from his seat on the throne. 

Abbey Road begins to skip. He should fix that.

He simply ducks his head and buries his fingers in his massive mane, lets the weight of his horns hold him there, and he weeps. 

\---------------------------------------------

He’s drunk, and the fucking light won’t go, and he wonders once again why he bothers with going downtown anyway, why he tolerates such bullshit like traffic lights and noisy crowds when he’s got scotch at home and-

“What’s the matter?” He doesn’t bother glancing over to the passenger’s seat, because he doesn’t exactly recall his passenger’s _name_ , but he does recall soft lips on his ear and murmured promises and, oh yes, that was why he went downtown. 

“Long light.” He grumbles. A pedestrian is pressing the cross button, so it’s going to be _longer_ now and he wishes he’d thought up like, wings for the self driving car. Inconsiderate pedestrians with their stupid… feet. Who’s leaving the aquarium at eleven PM, anyway? 

He squints into the darkness, flashing his brights just to try and hurry her along, and the girl crossing the street doesn’t even bother to turn her head, just extends a lazy middle finger at him, her saunter growing even slower, and he can’t help himself, he bares his teeth in an amused grin, and then -

Was that an earthquake?

For a second it felt like everything had moved.

The girl notices it too, she falls still, bracing herself, looking all around, her eyes wide like a wild animal, and Capra feels something begin to click - is that, does he know-

“Light’s green.” His passenger points out, and the girl comes to her senses as a car on the other side of the road honks, and she dashes off into the night like a startled deer. 

Huh.

Weird night, he guesses. 

\----------------------------------------------

They stir. 

They haven’t bothered stirring in so long, because down here there is nothing to do but sit and observe and ponder how it is that after all this time, after hundreds of years, they are still doomed to fester underground, bodiless, powerless.

They once wanted to grow up. 

Later, they just wanted to die. 

They have spent so long, watching the souls plummet from the ceiling like drips of pitch, so gradual, so frustrating. They have watched the abominations - oh god, the thing they had made out of their brother, brilliant, heartless Dr. Alphys touching things she could never understand just because they were there… the fractures in time, the screaming souls distorting behind a curtain blacker than black…

They have watched their mother withdraw, frightened and broken. Their father grow weak and craven with time. They have watched the souls of other humans being plucked out, like daisies, like buttercups.

They have watched generations of monsters suffer. 

They have suffered. 

Today, like a meteor, a soul has fallen. The shockwaves from their impact wake Chara from their lethargic place, and they feel - oh, they know this type of soul. They had once _had_ this type of soul. The baby leech, drawing magic in, filling themselves to the brim...filling themselves with fire magic, gravity magic, with wind and ice, with speed, with spears, and with all the magic just outside of themselves. With time. With the void, with whatever Sans and Papyrus were made out of, with everything.

They are too weak, too powerless still, but they know this soul. 

They could _guide_ this soul, if the child would let them. 

They could take that warmth and power in that blazing red soul, and they could temper it, refine it, rework it into something malleable, a tool. They could chill it, if they were strong enough.

Or…

Perhaps this child will be strong enough to finally release Chara from their torment.

Perhaps that final ember of bitter determination will be extinguished.

Perhaps it will be chilled.


	164. Last Goodbye

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

“ok.” Sans is saying. “ok, that makes sense, how you fell down. but kid. i’m still missing part of the picture. how did, y’know - you got us out, you did it right-”

**”Not every time!** Frisk says pathetically. **Chara… they…. they find the weak spots in your soul and they push at them. If you don’t … if you aren’t good, they get stronger. There were times I did bad, Sans. I did bad, and I RESET, so I wouldn’t have done those bad things, and I tried and I tried until I did it right. I thought they’d be okay, then, but… They weren’t. They get their strength from when people do things that hurt, because that’s all that’s left of Chara, it’s the hurt-”**

“Jesus, there you are!” A new voice interrupts. You whirl around and can’t help but raise your eyebrows as Nat comes puffing in, Shadow on her (metaphorical) tail. “Jeez, kid, you can’t just take off like that, I can’t catch up with robot kneeeee…. the fuck is that.” She trails off, looking at the thrashing mass of vines in the middle of the jail cell. The column is growing wider now, constantly shifting. Tiny little yellow flowers keep erupting between the leaves, blooming, and then shriveling and dying in an instant.

“that’s flowey.” Sans says, deadpan.

“FLOWEY?” Your head jerks up again, and you don’t know whether to feel relieved or anxious - Papyrus, Capra and Mettaton have joined you in the small atrium, and Papyrus is looking horrified as he stares into the cell.

**”No.”** Frisk’s voice in your head is sudden and unexpected. **”That isn’t Flowey. That’s Asriel.”** They look around at everyone, face set in stubborn determination, that expression that’s so familiar in no small part because, well… it ran in your family. They lock eyes with everyone, and only when it becomes clear that nobody will argue, their lip quivers. **”That’s my friend.”** They mutter. **” I didn’t save him before and now this happened. We have to help him.”**

“HELL YEAH!” You don’t even turn your head to recognize Undyne’s voice, though a soft,

“S-sweetie, please-” from next to her tells you what you need to know. Ah, hell. The gang’s all here. 

Just in time for the apocalypse. 

“It’s too late.” A tiny, dejected voice pops up. “They’ve been planning this for too long.” You turn to look for the source, and spot, in the corner of the atrium, a new spray of green. A flower, deformed almost beyond recognition, is swaying, somehow conveying its exhaustion, from a stem too thin to support it. You’ve seen things like this before, in photos that show the mutations of flowers that have grown in places poisoned by nuclear radiation, the petals too numerous and in the wrong spots, the center stretched out impossibly long and just… wrong. It made you want to recoil, made you think of disease and blight and things that you didn’t want to touch you ever, ever, ever… 

But a child’s voice was coming from its mutated center, so you have to stop and listen all the same.

(“Aw. What the fuck.” Capra mutters in the back of the room to himself.)

“Why is it too late, Asriel?” You beg (assuming the poor, mutilated thing _is_ Asriel), and then grimace as the floor rumbles again. “What’s happening?” 

“They’re…. Chara’s making me…” The flower begins, and then cries out in something like pain. “I can’t! They won’t let me-”

“Spit it out, kid.” Capra’s moved up to your side, to your surprise. He’s deliberately giving a command, and for a moment, you simply pray it’ll work. There’s a moment’s hesitation, then-

“Chara’s trying to get enough power to RESET back to when we were kids! Hundreds of years ago! They think they can do something different so we don’t both have to die, but - we did die! We did, and we should have stayed dead.” Flowey - Asriel - bleats. 

“gettin’ power how?” Sans needs to know.

“Me! Chara gets strong from hurt and pain, and they need to make a _lot_ of hurt and pain, more than almost _anything_ to have enough power to RESET that far, out here in the real world. They found the monster dust when someone led them right there, and that was enough-”

“Shit.” Says Capra.

“Shit.” Nat echoes.

“...Shit.” Shadow adds thoughtfully, but Asriel’s already plowing on.

“It was enough for them to get strong enough to control me. That Dust lets them be strong because it’s pure… you know.” He manages to lift the blossom serving for his head at Sans. “It’s violence. It’s-”

“LOVE.” Sans whispers, a tone you’ve never heard before, his eyesockets suddenly enormous. 

“...What.” Capra says, a second later. 

“level of violence.” Sans says, as if it should be obvious.

“Level of… well, that’s a shitty acronym, where’s the E-” Capra begins to protest, but Sans distractedly holds up a hand, cutting him off.

“so they’re gonna use the dust to start the reset?” He demands, and Asriel lets out a sickly, miserable laugh.

“Of course not. That’s not nearly enough power, to reset more than two hundred years of _everything_ ” They whisper. “That’s just to control me. Not that it’s hard. No soul. I shouldn’t even be here-”

“Oh. Oh god.” Alphys breathes, from somewhere in the back of the room. “I d-did this. This is-”

“Shh.” Undyne murmurs, pulling Alphys close.

“It’s not your fault, Dr. Alphys.” Asriel says kindly. “You tried. It’s because of what I am.”

“whaddyamean?” Sans forges onwards.

“I am a flower, because when my body turned to dust, just a few caves away from here in my father’s garden, my dust settled into the flowerbeds and I became part of the earth and the flowers.”

“OH!” Papyrus exclaims, as if something is suddenly making sense to him, but when everyone turns to look at him, he shrugs. “I KNEW THERE WAS SOMETHING SPECIAL ABOUT THOSE PLANTS!” 

“Thank you, Papyrus. I’m sorry we had a hard time-” Asriel starts, then groans quietly. “They’re stretching me further. I’m running out of time before I’m not strong enough to tell you.”

“s’ok. cliffs notes. uh, i mean, condensed version.” Sans says, realizing that Asriel probably had not had the time or ability to become acclimated to human slang. 

“Because I was reborn as a flower, Chara could use the little stolen magic they had at the time to compel me to… germinate. They didn’t know if it would work, but.. it worked.” Asriel whimpers. “Now, there are… there are so many of me. It _hurts._ ” Their voice is very small and childlike now.

“What are they planning, Flowey? What do they need lots of you for?” You say, trying to sound as calm and cool as possible. There is a sudden clanging - the iron bars of the cell are bowing outwards, crushed by the massive column of twisting vines that has grown to fill the whole cell. Asriel whimpers. 

“Before I was a flower.” He finally manages. “I had different magic. Mom and Dad could both do fire, and Mom can heal, but I was different. I could change how I looked. I was-”

“a shapeshifter.” You and Sans whisper at the same time, and Frisk nods vigorously. 

**”Underground.”** They mutter. **”When I fought him, he changed. First he was a flower, then he was a grown up, then he was him.”**

“Now, all around Ebott… my roots have grown.” Asriel whispers. “I am sprouting up everywhere right now. I can’t stop it. Chara is at my core, using the magic they stole from you-” It waves a leaf weakly in your direction. “-Making me sprout everywhere that humans gather. In every store, every school, every movie theater and mall and parking lot and backyard and… I’m _everywhere_ ” They whimper pathetically. “And in a few moments, they’ll tell me to change.”

“Into WHAT?” Undyne demands. 

“Into what every human thinks about when they hear the word ‘monster.’” Asriel says. “I will be the thing in every closet, the thing that grabs feet hanging over the edge of the bed. Chara understands what humans fear, and in every single place in Ebott, I’m going to be that fear.” 

Oh. Oh god, you think you’re getting it. You can imagine people going about their business, humans doing human things when suddenly, up from the ground, what - demons? Zombies, ghosts, manic grinning bloody faces with sharp teeth and talons, fucking, fucking Slenderman, but everywhere, but all at once-

“i don’t get it.” Sans is saying. 

“I do.” You whisper. “Sans, what do you think will happen? All these humans, so many of them are already on edge because they’re not used to a world with magic, with monsters and suddenly their worst fear is going to come true. There’s already been so much conflict, and that’s with the cute monsters. With the friendly ones. They’re going to see these nightmares from Chara’s imagination, and they’re going to do what humans that are scared do.” 

Sans looks at you blankly, but Mettaton, who’s been standing in the back, rubbing Alphys’ shoulders, speaks up. 

“They’re going to attack.” He breathes mournfully. 

“Chara thrives on hurt.” Asriel repeats. “If I attacked them, it would just be violence from me. It wouldn’t be enough to do anything. But humans are humans. They’ll take the first step. In a few minutes, there will be enough violence to give Chara the power to turn the universe inside out. They’ll unravel everything. There’s going to be more LOVE than any of us can ever stop.”

“Well, shit.” Capra speaks up. “Shit, uh, hey, Asriel? Don’t do it. Don’t listen to Chara.” He says confidently, then turns to look at you all, grinning. “See? Fixed. Peter’s the hero, day saved, let’s have a goddamn wedd-”

Asriel cries out in pain, a bleat of panic. “C-can’t stop!” He whimpers, and all around you, you hear that refrain echoed, and you think about the thousand, thousand flowers that are opening as Asriel is stretched infinitely thin. “Chara’s _stronger_ than you! They have Dennis’ magic! They have Dust!”

There’s a pause as that sinks in, and everyone registers the predicament. 

“...Well, fuck, that’s me. I’m out. Anyone else got something?” Capra says with a sigh, and paces back, through the group, to Mettaton. Nat’s eyes track his motion, then turn to Asriel. 

“Uh. Hi there. I’m Nat. We haven’t, uh… okay. So. Say there wasn’t anymore dust. Say we found it and got it away from Chara, somehow. Could you stop, then?”

“...Maybe.” Asriel forces out. “I’d die, but-”

“ **NO!** ” Frisk forces out, charging forward from behind your leg. **”We’re going to help you!”**

“Frisk…” Asriel’s voice is almost gentle now. “I haven’t had a soul for hundreds of years. I can’t-”

“ **Well, then we’ll go _get_ your soul!** ” Frisk demands, and then turns and stares up at you. “ **She can do it! She can travel through time-** ”

“Frisk, I can’t go that far back!” You tell them urgently. “I’ve only got enough magic left for _maybe_ one short trip-”

“So you’d better make it count.” There’s a new speaker in the room. Everyone turns, at once, to look at the new voice, the figure who’s blended in seamlessly with the group of your friends, your family, your loved ones. Everyone jerks back, alarmed. 

You recognize her first. 

It’s you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey look [at this gross shit this is where I got the flowey idea from well not here but the site I saw it on shut down u dig ](http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/fukushima-disaster-mutant-flowers-found-6123991)


	165. Bring It In, Guys!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr, where u can support your favorite starving fartist](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [f.art or be f.arted](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [live art stream tonight if'n ya need to come talk to me some more](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

There’s a second where everyone stares at the other you. The older you. The much older you. She’s gotta be in her seventies, maybe even eighties, but she still stands with a straight back and a light in her eyes, and there’s, well, the _skarm_.

Capra speaks up first.

“You gotta come in with a fucking comment, don’t you?” He snorts, then looks between the two of you as the older you laughs. “Is this a paradox? I feel like this is a paradox.”

“No, Pete.” Old-you says with a sigh. “Not a paradox. I’ve just got to make sure that I do this later.”

Sans, next to you, is trembling. He’s fit his hand back into yours and he’s shaking, and when you look at him, you’re startled to see the relief, the sheer exultation on his face. He meets your eyes, and, seeing your surprised expression, he says:

“you… **you get to grow old.** ” Old-you beams at him for that.

“Thank you, my love.” She says, then turns to you, gripping both of your shoulders and tearing you away from the astonished faces of your friends. “You know I don’t have much time. I had enough magic left for one short trip. This is it.”

“Okay.” You breathe, looking into your own eyes. “Okay. What do we do?” She smiles kindly at you.

“You and Frisk are going back. Quite a long ways.” Your brow furrows at that, and, of course, of _course_ you can’t help it, you argue with yourself- 

“I don’t have enough magic! And you’re using it right now, so-”

“Oh, it’s not your magic.” She turns away, and smiles at Alphys, picking her out from where she’s cowering next to Undyne. “Alphys helps. She’ll get you back there.” 

“W-what?!” Alphys exclaims. “B-b-b-but I can’t! I haven’t b-built _anything_ that can do something like that! I c-c-can’t help her time travel, um, y-you time travel, I’m _useless_ , all I did was _ruin_ -” She trails off as the older you releases your shoulders, and strides over to Alphys. She leans over and kisses her scaly forehead, then whispers something you can’t make out. Alphys stands stock still, but behind her glasses, her eyes grow wider and wider. 

“Oh.” She murmurs. “Ohhhh.” 

“What?!” Undyne demands. “What did she-”

“I will.” Alphys says, with sudden determination. Her eyes glint as she rises from her usual hunched posture, and she looks at you, then Undyne, then the rest of the room. “I haven’t figured out how to do it yet, but I have time. I will.” She says, enunciating every syllable with perfect clarity. 

“You do.” Old-you says, smiling at her. “It will be your life’s work. Gaster’s, too.”

“aw, what-”

“I know, sweetheart.” Old-you sighs. “It’s necessary. Besides, he mellows with age, and Cody really takes to him-”

“Cody? My buddy?” Undyne says, surprised, and old-you looks at her, her smile suddenly a little brittle. 

“I’m running out of time.” She sighs, then turns back to you, leaning until she spots Frisk, half hidden behind you and Sans. She holds out her skeletal hand, and presses something, a tiny device, cold and metallic and much heavier than it should be, into your grasp. It has a small, raised, red button. “This will open a… oh, a tunnel. Like how you make shortcuts through space? We figured it must be possible to do it with time, too, since Sans can do it on his own. I know, love, just a little.” She says, cutting off his expected complaint. “This will open up on the other end to where you’ll need to be. Do _not_ let it close, because otherwise you’ll be stuck on the other side of the barrier and almost certainly create a paradox that will tear this whole thing apart. In that order.” She tells you sternly.

“Well, yeah-” You begin, and then she chuckles, looking at you. 

“I know. Sorry. Between Dot and C- well… I got the mom voice.” She says, then leans down to get eye level with Frisk. “Frisk, sweetheart… This is going to be tough, but I know that you have it in you to be brave, okay? Can I count on you to help save the day?”

**”I’m used to it.”** Frisk insists, stepping out from behind you to look stubbornly up at your older self. **”Whatever happens, I can do it.”**

“I know you can.” Old-you says, then looks around the cluster of you again. “Jeez, it’s funny to see you all so young again.” She mutters to herself, then sighs. “I’m forgetting someone. Asriel.”

“I…” Everyone turns. The tiny flower in the corner is nearly dead now, the thrashing mass of vines and thorns and leaves in the center of the cell even bigger.

“Don’t lose hope.” She breathes. “It’ll all be over soon.”

“...” The flower makes a rasping sound, like he’s trying to breathe, and then - “It’s starting.” He forces out, and the bloom shrivels and dies. 

“That’s my cue.” Old-you says. “Me and Frisk are going back. Pete, you, Nat and Shadow need to cut Chara off from the Dust.”

“How-” Nat begins, but old-you is speaking in a rush now, and you know she must be nearly out of magic to get back home. “Sans, you and Undyne need to move to where there’s danger of an outburst of violence. Try to stop it wherever you can. Alphys, Mettaton, you’ve got to get the word out. Every monster, every person needs to know not to attack. If the LOVE-”

“Bad acronym-”

“CHRIST, Cap!” Well, she’s definitely you. “If Chara gets strong enough, nothing I told you matters because they’ll reset this too.”

“WHAT ABOUT ME?” Papyrus interjects to exclaim. “I CAN HELP, I-”

“Paps, you need to stay right here.” Old-you orders. Papyrus’ face falls.

“OH. I UNDERSTAND-”

“You’ve got the most important job of all.” Old-you assures him, and suddenly smiles again. “You’re going to need to make a trap.” 

“OH!” Papyrus has a split second of delighted inhalation, but somehow manages to contain himself before he shrieks with glee. Old-you turns back to you.

“Time’s up.” She mutters. “I - This is going to be tough. I’m sorry.” She steps back, taking in the entire room, all the people, the thrashing mass of vines. “I love you all.” She whispers. “See you later.”

She - you - she takes a step, and she’s gone.

There is a single moment where everything that’s just happened registers with everyone, a moment of calm, of gathering willpower. 

“I love you all too.” You finally breathe. 

“We know. You just said.” Undyne points out, and then glances at Sans. “Time to get a move on, big guy. We’ve got people to save. Just like old times.”

“just like old times.” Sans agrees, and turns to you, leaning into you and kissing you roughly, holding you so tight, just for a moment. “love ya.” He whispers. “see ya on the other side?”

“Love you too.” You murmur. “Go. Be safe. Be smart.”

“i always am.” He lies, slapping a big, enormous, fully fake grin on his face. He turns to Papyrus. “paps, bud, this is important. remember back when we watched home alone?”

“YES? SANS, WHAT IS IT?”

“nothin’, just that was a good movie. later bro!” 

He probably has just enough time to hear Papyrus’ indignant screech before he snatches Undyne’s arm, tearing her away from a last kiss with Alphys, and the two of them disappear towards the frontlines. 

Capra stares into the space Sans and Undyne have just disappeared into, opens his mouth, shakes his head, then turns to Nat and Shadow. “Okay, interns. Time to use those big brains I pay you for.”

“Not very much.” Shadow points out. 

“Well, yeah. You're interns.” Capra sighs. “Help me out here. I got a little caught up on the Dust last night with Mettaton, but I’m kinda flying blind here. You found it in those caves, yeah?”

“Yeah.” Nat agrees. “Bunch of pots. Urns. Full of Dust. Lots and lots, like, a few thousand.” 

“Oh boy. I don’t know what units to convert that into. How much Dust equals like, how much magic- actually, know what, that’s not important.” Capra muses. “Question. This Chara fuck.” 

“Cap. It’s a kid.” You sigh, and he looks indignantly at you.

“ _Yeah, uh, KINDA._ ” He drawls pointedly. “Anyway. Anyone ever see ‘em outside the caves under Mt. Ebott? Anyone had any spooky haunting experiences anywhere else?” 

“Uhhh….” You wrack your brains. “Not that I can-”

“Right. I mean, that’s some classic ghost shit.” Capra says confidently. Mettaton starts, making an indignant noise, and Capra gives him a tight grin. “Not your sort of ghost, Threep. The human-variety. Generally bound to a place of trauma. I’m guessing this mountain.”

“Okay, but ghosts aren’t real…” Nat begins in her most know-it-all tone, and then blinks. “Wait. Shit. Sorry. Apparently scientific method’s out the window today.”

“Fuck no. It’s all we’ve got. Our observable data is just weak and we’ve only got one chance to get the hypothesis right, so let’s use the aforementioned big fucking intern brains, yeah?!” Capra demands. You’re glancing down at Frisk, and he snaps. “You’re not off the hook, either, kid. You’ve got a big fucking brain too, and you were technically an intern, so-”

“Okay. Okay.” You exhale, ignoring Mettaton as he reaches into the pocket of your wedding dress and grabs your phone.

“This is a monster phone, right, darling?” He murmurs.

“Yeah, uh-”

“Perfect. That’s all I need, thank you.” He heads over to Alphys, who is standing stock still, looking a strange mix of broken and confident, and immediately begins muttering with her. 

“ANYWAY.” Capra grabs your attention again as the ground shakes. “Data we have: There’s a few thousand pots of dead-monster-gravy out there somewhere-”

“Really?” Shadow drawls. Capra pushes on;

“The ghost thing that took ‘em brought them _somewhere_ to be able to use them right now. Makes sense. Probably needs to be near our flower friend to be able to boss him around. There’s gotta be some sort of nerve center. And that nerve center has to be somewhere in this mountain that’s big enough to store a shitton of pots of Dust, but somewhere that nobody ever goes. Any ideas?”

There’s a long moment where nobody says anything, barring Alphys and Mettaton muttering in the corner, hunched over the phone. Papyrus doesn’t look like he’s listening - he’s staring at the stairs that lead to the hallway connecting this room to the rest of the palace, a particularly vacant look on his face that you know means that he’s thinking very, very hard. 

**”Um.”** A tiny voice rings out in your head. You whirl to look at Frisk, who suddenly looks very shy and sheepish. “ **I know a place like that.** ” They hesitate as all eyes fall on them, and then squeak, “ **The… Ruins? Where I fell down? Where I met Flowey? That’s where Asriel and Chara used to live. With my mom.** ” 

There’s a brief pause, then Shadow mutters, “Shit. Yes. That makes sense.” He looks at Nat, then you. “Can you make us a shortcut?”

“I can try.” You mutter. “I don’t know where that is.” 

“OH!” Papyrus chimes in. “YOU KNOW OUR OLD HOUSE IN SNOWDIN?” 

“Yeah, Paps?” You say tentatively. 

“IF YOU FACE THE FRONT DOOR, IT’S LIKE WAY OVER TO THE LEFT!” Papyrus says cheerfully. “DOES THAT HELP?!”

...Well, it’s something. You close your eyes, concentrating very hard, then punch a hole, using your knowledge of what Papyrus might consider “way over” to be. Shadow bounds over to the hole and sticks his head through. 

“Close enough.” He says, coming back with just a little snow on his whiskers. He grins at Frisk. “Great job, kid. Okay. Yes. Let’s do this.” Capra looks between you, Nat and Shadow in astonishment. 

“I”m gonna make that kid an intern.” He grumbles, then winces. “Two seconds.”

“Cap, time?!!” You remind him as the ground rumbles once again. He ignores you, already making his way over to Mettaton. 

“Look.” He mutters. “I knew I said you’d come with me next time I did this shit, but it looks like it’s not in the card-mphh-” He’s cut off as Mettaton turns and kisses him.

“Shh.” The robot mutters, after a moment. “You can do this. Do you have a plan?” 

“Not… yet.” Capra admits.

“Well.” Mettaton studies him. “You’ll have to use that big fucking brain, won’t you?” His smile nearly breaks your heart. 

“Goddamn, I love it when you swear.” Capra sighs. 

“I love _you._ ” Mettaton stresses. 

“I love you too, Mettaton.” Capra mutters, looking distressed. “Stay safe?”

“I’ll try.” Mettaton replies softly. “Now go on. Be brave. Don’t pretend you’re not having fun on my account, either.”

“Oh goddamn it.” Capra grunts, then bursts out laughing. He kisses Mettaton one last time, then whirls, that manic grin on his face. “INTERNS!” He barks out, his eyes glinting when Nat and Shadow, who have been having their own private conversation, jump to attention. “Let’s go save the motherfucking world!” He crows. 

“No punching abominations.” You warn him as he prepares to step through the portal. 

“No promises.” He laughs, and charges through, Nat and Shadow a heartbeat behind him. At last, it’s just you, Papyrus, Frisk, Alphys and Mettaton. The latter looks at you apologetically. 

“Er. Not to leave you alone. But to use this thing to broadcast - “ He holds your phone up, “We should really be at the highest place we can get to, so I’m afraid-”

“On it.” You mutter, concentrating - oh, this is a new one, you’ve never opened two shortcuts at once before, and you feel the strain of keeping the new one, leading to the peak of Mt. Ebott, open. “Good luck, guys. Stay safe. Love you.” In response, cool, metallic lips brush your cheek, and you’re briefly enveloped by a soft, squishy, scaly hug. 

“L-love you too. And you, Frisk. Good luck.” Alphys whispers. The two of them step through to the peak, and now it’s just you, Frisk, and Papyrus, who is looking at the stairs again. 

“I NEED TO GET TRAP SUPPLIES. YOU SAID I WILL MAKE ONE.” He says distractedly. “YOU SHOULD DO YOUR... THING.” 

“Oh god, I don’t even know what we’re supposed to do.” You admit to him, and he beams at you and Frisk. 

“YOU’RE HUMANS! YOU’RE KIND AND CLEVER AND SMART AND MY BEST FRIENDS! YOU’LL FIGURE IT OUT! THE GREAT PAPYRUS HAS NO DOUBT!” He announces grandly, and then grabs both of you in a hug, lifting you off your feet. “STILL.” He says after a moment. “GOOD LUCK. I LOVE YOU!”

“Love you too, Paps.” You breathe as Frisk nods, and the two of you watch as he goes tearing up the staircase. 

Now it’s just you. “Ready, bud?” You breathe. Frisk nods again. 

The ground rumbles underneath you. 

You examine the small, heavy device in your hand one last time. 

You press the button.


	166. Battle Against A True Hero

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [come to stream tonight!](https://picarto.tv/Wrexington)

Mettaton and Alphys are at the top of Mt. Ebott, even higher than the top, really, they’ve scaled an EbbCo observation tower and they are at the absolute apex, and they can see all of the town, they can see the streets beginning to bulge and crack, _things_ beginning to crawl out-

“Let’s hope this works.” Mettaton whispers.

“It will.” Alphys says, back rigid, dripping with focus and confidence. “Remember. They all have to know not to hurt Flowey. I d-don’t think that Chara will make Flowey hurt them first. They want LOVE, so it can’t be defensive, it has to be violent acts from other people to give them enough power to d-do what they’re trying to do.”

“Okay.” Mettaton says, trying not to think about Peter miles below them, almost certainly diving into harm's way. “Showtime.”

They begin the transmission.  
\-----------------------------------------

The guests have all assembled on the cliffside for the wedding, but no humans or monsters are sitting, because everyone can sense that something’s wrong. The ground is shaking too often, and the air tastes like… perhaps, like ozone. Toriel, head and shoulders over the rest, keeps craning her neck, looking for Frisk. 

The ground rumbles again, and everyone tenses. Lawyerpants peels off from the crowd of friends he’s been nervously conferring with, grabbing his date’s hand. 

“Something bad’s about to happen.” He murmurs in her ear. “I can just tell. You want me to get you somewhere safe?” She gives him an affronted look, shaking her head at once. 

“Hell no. I’m pretty sure you’re on your eighth life, as it is. We stick together.”

God, he loves this human. 

Everyone suddenly jumps as the tone of an emergency broadcast comes from every pocket, every purse - a hundred-odd cellphones suddenly screaming the same warning, before Mettaton’s voice comes on.

“Attention.” It begins, “This is an emergency situation. This is not a test. A being is attempting to create destruction by inciting violence. We anticipate apparitions emerging from the ground, which may appear... terrifying. Do not attack apparitions. We believe they will not harm you. Stay indoors if possible, or retreat to an area without apparitions. Do not engage. Repeat. Do not engage.”  
\----------------------------------------

Grillby turns to his daughter, Corona, and he takes a moment to admire the young woman she’s grown into. She’s already halfway to the cliff, surveying the scene, trying to find the places with the most need. He knows what she’s thinking, because he’s thinking it too.

“Sweetheart, please translate.” He requests from behind her.

“On it.” She murmurs, and then, repeats her father’s words, translating from firespeech to English. “If someone is trying to incite violence, the monsters in the town may require assistance.” She belts out. “Those of you who are able, we may need to volunteer - we will need teams in densely populated monster areas, and places with large human populations alike. We will likely also need first aid-”

“Yes.” Toriel interjects. “Those of you who are gifted at healing, stay with me here.”

“Do we have any volunteers?” Grillby/Corona request. There is a split second of silence in the crowd of wedding guests, and then every single hand raises, at once, into the air.

“Great.” Corona mutters to her father. “Now how are we gonna get them down there in time?”

“hi.” A familiar voice behind her says. “guessin’ you guys need some shortcuts.” Sans is there, the usual way he is, unexpected and cracking a joke, and only Grillby knows him well enough to see the fear in his lazy smile.

Grillby claps Sans on the shoulder, watching Undyne sprint to Toriel from the corner of his eye.

“What are we waiting for?” A reedy voice pipes up. “They need us down there!” Tommy and Aaron have made their way to the front of the crowd, and are staring at Sans expectantly. 

“damn straight.” Sans says brusquely, brushing his hands together. “ok. first team, downtown. about 50 of you. diplomats, good talkers, people with lots of friends. stop the humans down there from forming a mob. ok, doorway’s opening outside the aquarium, let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” A massive portal opens, and wedding guests, humans and monsters of all description, begin to funnel through.

Undyne has torn herself away from Toriel, who is looking petrified but perhaps a bit more certain. 

“Next group with me! Going to the monster developments! We need big and burly and intimidating, let’s move!” She roars out, and Sans, nodding, opens a second door, through which wolves and bears and spiders and dogs, even amalgamations begin to pour, accompanied by a few humans who meet Undyne’s requirements. 

“give a call when you need to move.” Sans instructs Undyne.

“Yep. Got it.” She mutters, then ducks through after her group. Sans does the same after his. They leave both shortcuts open.

The field that the wedding was planned for is practically empty now, save for Toriel, some bunnies and plant monsters and…

Well, yeah, and Jerry. 

\-----------------------------------------  
Dr. Stanley is driving home from his vet’s office, barely out of the parking lot, when the road beneath him begins to crumble. He comes screeching to a halt, his heart hammering, as first one fissure, then another, begins to form in the earth. 

Things are beginning to crawl out of the fissures. 

They are pale, or green, or brown, and slimy, and they reek of death. They don’t share any particular features - some have wide, white eyes, some gnashing teeth, some have limbs while others thrash on the ground like snakes. They only have one unifying quality - they are the stuff of nightmares.

He closes his eyes, then opens them, considering that he might be having a stroke. He is not. The things are still there and they have begun to moan.

“Dear lord…” He whispers, thinking, for a second, of the Rapture, of demons walking the earth, but then… oh, he notices something. He still figures himself fairly keen, and, well, he understands animal locomotion, so he notices the irregularity first. None of these creatures seem to be moving very far from the cracks in the earth from which they’d emerged. In fact, most are not fully emerged at all. 

They’re _rooted_ , he realizes, and at once, a theory occurs to him. He has seen plant monsters before, of course. He has treated them. Could this be-

His train of thought is interrupted by a screech, an emergency tone on his car’s radio, and a second later, Mettaton’s voice fills the small space. 

He listens, and he thinks very hard, watching. Some distance down the road, another car has stopped, and a man has emerged, battering at one of the plant creatures with a tire iron, and when another human sprints (perhaps having heard the same broadcast) to stop him, the man with the tire iron whirls and takes a swing at the human, screaming incoherently. 

Dr. Stanley gets out of his car, and sprints towards the fight, faster than his old body has moved in decades. He’ll save this girl from the tire iron man, and then he’ll head back to the practice and begin setting up supplies, clearing rooms, calming animals. 

People are going to need help. Monsters are going to need help.

He’ll be there. 

\------------------------------------------

He keeps thinking about how abrupt it was, yesterday, when the world snapped back into focus. After days of mindless, senseless, painful rage, of hands that itched to strangle, of vivid, horrifying fantasies of blood and fur and Dust (and Dust and Dust and Dust) and then-

It had been over. 

One second, he’d wanted to kill, he’d wanted literally nothing more than to kill a monster, any monster, even you, maybe even especially you... and the next, he was back, no longer crammed away to the barest corner of his mind, he was _back_.

He takes a deep breath in, looking at his mom in the front seat. They lock eyes in the rearview mirror, and he glances away, staring out the window as they approach his mom’s home, as the houses get smaller, the trees between the houses taller. 

Monsters are my friends, he tells himself.

It’s been his mantra for the past twenty four hours, after the fog had fallen away. It’s been what kept him grounded, assured him that whatever foul shit had been dribbled into his mind was gone now. If he could remember that, he’d be fine. He’d immediately flagged down an orderly in the hospital, and barked out, in short, panicked, raspy words, that he was back, that there had been some bad shit, some _magic_ shit, but it was over now. 

It had to be magic, he knew that, because the man he had been,the things he had done, oh that wasn’t Cody Parekh. Cody didn’t have knives. Cody didn’t want blood. Cody cared for penguins. Cody’s best friend at the aquarium was a monster. 

Apparently Asgore, the king of all monsters, agreed. Asgore must know something Cody didn’t know, because he’d been cleared for release to his mom right away, like, instantly, like… like they’d been expecting him to get better, even. It had been one more night in the hospital, sure, just to be certain, but now he was free, and he was determined. 

He was going to get to the bottom of this. Well. He was going to get to your wedding if it killed him, and he was going to hug Undyne until she slapped him, and he was going to beg your forgiveness, yours and Sans’ and Shadow’s and Nat, oh god, what Nat must think of him…

The ground jitters under the car as his mom pulls into the driveway, and he locks eyes with her in the mirror again. 

“ _Bhookamp?_ ” His mom whispers quietly, and Cody shakes his head, not really knowing why. 

“I don’t think so. Too short for an earthquake.” He mutters, then a thought occurs to him. “Mom, where’s Asha?”

“She is still grounded. She had better be in her room studying, or - Cody, where are you going, come back-” Something suddenly clicks, and a second later he’s out of the car, his feet slapping the pavement loudly as he _sprints_ to the backyard, because he’s been buried in magic for fucking days now, and he can tell, he can practically taste it, all the hairs on his arms are standing up.

Asha’s a little hellion, and Cody knows her habits too well. She doesn’t stay inside when she’s grounded, she can climb out the window and hide out in her treefort with a book and a juice box and her binoculars. He’d made the fort for her - it’s a little plywood treehouse, with an open door and windows on all the walls, about twelve feet off the ground. She plays spy up in there, and, until that switch in his head had been flipped, he’d been content to let her skirt their mom’s rules, and to just… keep an eye on her from a distance. But he knows, even before the emergency tone starts screeching from the phone in his pocket, he knows that he doesn’t want her at a distance, not today, because something’s going down-

“Cody!” His mom yells after him. 

“Mom, get inside!” He yells back. “Something’s-”

The ground shakes, and Cody has just enough time to spot Asha’s little face, peeking out of her fort window, before it begins to erupt beneath him. 

Cody has played football, basketball, lacrosse, and hockey. He moves instinctively, not even registering what’s happening, just glancing over his shoulder to ensure that his mom is, yes, going inside, and simultaneously leaping for the tree. He’s up the wooden boards he’d nailed in to make a ladder for Asha in a second flat, hearing her panic, and his phone is still going -

“Do not attack any apparitions. We believe they will not harm you. Stay-”

“CODY!” Asha screams, springing into his arms, and he grabs her tight.

“I gotcha.” He whispers. “Don’t worry. I gotcha.”

“What’s happening?!” She says, her eyes like saucers, gaze boring into his face.

“Dunno-” He looks out of the doorway he’d just sprung through, and his stomach drops.

His backyard is suddenly crawling with things, eyeless, legless things, things with teeth that gnashed as they shrieked, reeking of rotting vegetation…

“Bruh…” He whispers, horrified.

Asha has wriggled free from his hold and is staring out the little window he’d built for her, taking in all the monsters - monsters? - roiling up from beneath the black soil. The things with mouths are groaning, sounding like they’re trying to make words.

He thinks they might be trying to say “sorry.”

“Cody.” Her voice is very quiet now. “What do we do?”

Monsters are my friends, he thinks.

“Please remain calm. Do not engage.” Mettaton’s voice is saying over the speaker of his phone.

“Let’s just… wait.” He whispers. “We’re safe up here.”

“We are?” Asha breathes, and he turns and nods at her, trying to look reassuring.

“Yeah. I think they’re just… monsters down there. Maybe different than what we’re used to.” He whispers. “I’m gonna call our friends, okay?” She nods, and turns back to the window, as, hands shaking, he tries to select Undyne’s number from his contacts.

He’s just pressing dial when the whoops and gunshots begin.

“Oh, not today, monster fucks!” A man’s voice crows. He recognizes it. It’s the next door neighbor, the guy Asha had spied on. “Not me, not MY family!” There’s another volley of gunfire and a sound like a scream, coming from all around them. Asha turns to him from her spot in the window, wide-eyed once again, and Cody slowly raises a finger to his lips, miming “shush”. She swallows and nods, and for a moment, everything is still and silent, and then - shit, the phone -

“Cody!?” Undyne’s voice rings out through the silence. “Cody, pal, where are you, are you-” He winces and quickly ends the call, but it’s too late.

“Oh, I hear you. Hiding up there.” The voice of the male neighbor is getting closer, and the monsters, whatever they are on the ground, renew their pained, panicked shrieks. “I knew it was your fault, you greasy curry monsterloving fucks. You brought this on us. YOU REAP WHAT YOU SOW.” Cody only has time to think for a second before he lunges for Asha, pulling her _down_ , quick, away from the window, and he backs her into a corner, hoping she can’t be seen, but he can hear feet now, someone ascending the wooden planks into the tree fort, and Asha opens her mouth to scream-

“Love you, Ash.” He whispers, and as the torso of the man and the barrel of the rifle come into view in the door of the little plywood fort, he charges, ducking, praying for enough momentum. He might just be a jock, that might be all people see him as, but he’s good for two things, even just as a jock:

1) He can play through the pain.

There’s a tremendously loud crack and a dull impact in his chest, but he doesn’t care, he’s running, and the pain might come later, it’s already creeping in, but-

2) He can make the hit.

His body connects with the man trying to invade the fort, trying to hurt Asha, and the man goes hurtling back at an odd angle, screaming. He lands funny - there’s a terrible crunch as his head bounces against a rock, and then it’s just Cody, slowly toppling from the doorframe after him as the pain of the gunshot begins to sink in. He lands on one of the roiling, vegetal monsters, but to his relief, it doesn’t strike. It practically cradles him, keening in pain and sorrow. He can hear his sister screaming, and all he can think is - fuck, fuck, he doesn’t want it to end like this, there’s another one next door, the woman, and Asha’s up there and he needs to get her to safety and he knows, deep inside, that he’s dying. 

Just before his vision goes black, he sees a doorway open, and Undyne comes tearing out, her eye wide and panicked, and he finds the strength to point up at the fort and whisper “Asha” before he slumps, knowing that she’ll be safe now. 

His last thought is that monsters are his friends.


	167. Enemy Approaching

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [I'm running stream tonight, so get at me HEEEERE!](https://picarto.tv/totalskeletondong)

“Jesus, I’m finally down here and it’s… uh, you know. It’s this…” Capra mutters. 

This was, after all… underwhelming.

“Why are you saying _this_ like that!” Nat says, indignant. “This is an archaeologist’s dream! This is the discovery of a lifetime, it’s a time capsule into-”

“Guys.” Shadow says, cutting them both off. “It’s just the ruins. Nobody even goes here.”

“Someone does.” Nat mutters. 

They’d stepped in, out of the snow and the pine forest of what Shadow had called Snowdin, what Capra had known as Papyrus and Sans’ hom, to a deserted edifice, a tunnel leading into a recently lived-in castle that had clearly been mostly forgotten. Already, Capra was anxious. 

What if they’d guessed wrong? What if this was not the secret location of a metric, by his approximation, _fuckload_ of Dust!? What if this wasn’t right at all, and he was - once-a-fucking-gain - trying to top his big moment of heroism with an even bigger moment, because you know what, Petey-boy, last time that ended with you being punched across an entire fucking cavern and-

“Look.” Shadow interjects, and beneath his tuxedo jacket (not that he was checking out the cat’s ass, jesus) Capra can see the intern’s tail begin to fluff up. He’d learned, from months of living with Ghost (and, well, from the single stab he’d made at seducing his lawyer) that this was, with cats, a very bad sign. Shadow’s pointing at something on the ground.

“Okay. Well. Is that Dust or dust, because like, this is the underground, this entire place is apparently a goldmine for dust miners, small d-”

“It’s Dust.” Nat says sharply, and both Capra and Shadow whirl to look at her. She glares at both of them, giving her most formidable look in her (oh, jesus, was this a _McCree cosplay_ ) bridesmaid dress and fancy makeup and curls, and he can’t help it, he shrivels under the intensity of that glare. “You can feel it.” Nat explains quietly. “Close your eyes. Even I can-”

“OH.” He barks out, finally having a bead on it. She’s … she’s not wrong. That little pile of shit on the ground has magic practically radiating out of it, like how it feels when he has his head on Mettaton’s chest, but-

bad. 

It is practically radiating bad, bad, bad vibes, and he remembers when he’d last felt something like that, realizes that it had been in the underground when he’d seen Paula, her mouth smeared with monster blood, and he shudders. He can feel the power in that Dust. 

“Oh god, it’s so much worse out in the open.” Shadow’s tail lashes as he takes it in. “I think I’m going to be s-”

“No time for hairballs, Rum Tum Tugger.” Capra interjects. “We’ve gotta… oh, what.” He trails off, practically feeling their astonishment. There’s an awkward pause, and then Nat clears her throat;

“ _You’ve seen Cats?!-_ ”

“I HAVE DONE WORSE THINGS TO GET LAID.” He roars, then slaps a hand over his mouth as this very important pronouncement echoes through the ruins, the words slowly growing distorted. Both Shadow and Nat glance off into the shadow darkness of the tunnel they are heading into. There’s a painful pause, and then Shadow licks the back of his paw, smooths back his whiskers and mutters, 

“Well. They certainly know we’re coming now.” 

Capra hesitates, then nods. “Whatever. It’s a ghost-kid. There’s three of us. Let’s go kick their ass.” He waits until both of his interns nod back, then he grins and heads off, at a full on run, ignoring the complaint of 

“Oh, fuck you, robot knees! I have robot knees-”

“Catch me up!” He demands. His converse aren’t the best shoes for running, and there’s lots to navigate, but this still feels good, sprinting past traps that must have been triggered by - fuck, by Frisk - and letting his legs stretch out and his lungs burn because he hadn’t been keeping up with his conditioning since high school, but still, now _this_ was podracing! Well. Racing. Well, whatever. There was a clock that was ticking, and he was being guided by a feeling in his chest now, recognizing that power from that little pile of Dust, but a million times greater, and he doesn’t even expect it when he bursts into a cavern.

The ground - that part of the ground that he can see - is a carpet of yellow flowers, screaming and writhing, and in the center of the room, a tree, a fucking Jack and the Beanstalk vine is vivisecting the cavern (wrong word, vivisecting, but somehow right too), punching through a hole in the ceiling that must be to the outside, allowing only the barest slivers of sunlight in to illuminate the rest of the room, the massive pyramid of Dust that the vine has erupted from like a vile worm sticking out of an anthill. 

At the base of the pile of Dust, in the shadows, two red eyes glint. 

“I was wondering when you’d show up.” Chara says cheerfully. 

 

\-----------------------

Papyrus has just returned to the room where the cells are with his trap supplies - limited as they are - when he hears the voices at the top of the stairs. Normally, he would bound over to those voices, try to participate, but today, he falls still, practically vibrating, thinking so hard as he tries to identify them. 

“I don’t-t-t understand, we _can’t-_ ”

“We must.” He knows that voice, and he feels a crawling sensation over skin that isn’t there. Asgore’s tone is deep and dire and unsettling, and it puts his teeth on edge just listening to it. Something is very wrong, wronger than the Flowey - no, he corrects himself, the Asriel thing.

“We can’t-t!” The other voice exclaims again, and now Papyrus knows it, feels stupid for missing it even for a second. “The consequences-”

“It will save our people!” Asgore bellows. “At present, every single monster life is at risk! If we press the button-”

“The machine was dangerous-s-s even _before_ I started to dismantle it!” Gaster hisses back, furious. 

Oh. The machine. Yes. He’d heard about the machine, in whispers, in stolen moments between Undyne and Alphys that he’d happened to interrupt, half-heard conversations between you and Sans. The sleep machine, the one you might never wake up from, that all mages might never wake up from. 

“It’s the only way I can think of.” Asgore says sorrowfully, and Papyrus realizes, all at once, that the king doesn’t know. He has no idea that Peter is down in the ruins, battling one child, that there is a yawning portal to SOMEWHERE in the past open in this cell, that you and Frisk are likely locked in mortal combat elsewhere. He doesn’t know about the violence and how Chara is feeding on it. He only knows that there is a way to make it stop. 

“It could-d-d kill _all_ humans, for all that I know. It is h-h-highly unstable-” Gaster begins, though not particularly optimistically. 

“Dr. Gaster.” Asgore’s voice is heavy with regret, weary, bitter, exhausted… done. “We all must do our part. It is … I must… a king must-

“B-but Frisk!” Gaster sounds frantic now. “They are your-r _child_ , and a human, and a mage!”

“Frisk…” Asgore’s voice is deeper still, and suddenly, suddenly Papyrus knows. 

This is the moment. 

First step, analysis: there are three cells down here. One is occupied by a portal and writhing leaves and is the closest to the stairs. The other two are empty. The first has his supplies, and -

Action. He grabs what he has brought, slams the cell door shut so Asgore can’t see in, and then screams out- 

“SOMEBODY! I NEED HELP WITH FRISK!” 

Third cell down now, furthest from the staircase leading to this prison level. Empty, illuminated only by a bare bulb in the ceiling. He concentrates, sends out a pulse of blue energy, a bone shard erupts in the middle of the air and the bulb shatters, and there are heavy footsteps on the stairs now. There are no windows down here, much to Gaster’s former distaste, and destroying the bulb plunges the third cell into almost total darkness. 

People often think that Papyrus doesn’t listen. 

He listens. 

If he fails to stop Asgore from pressing a button, deploying a wave of energy that might just kill every human, then all is lost. All will be utterly lost. 

Chara is somewhere deep and dark and is feeding on Dust only until there is enough violence, pure, distilled violence in the air for them to gather, because this was a way that humans, that things that had once been human gained strength. Violence and terror could be a form of strength, that energy could be enough to unfashion the entire world, if it was directed through the lens of the mind of an eternal child who had never known anything but hurt. 

To press the button, to even theoretically condemn every human to their doom, that would be an act of supreme violence. Done with the best of intentions. Done because Asgore grappled, as rulers must always grapple, with his responsibility towards his subjects, his people, his family, his friends. 

“Papyrus?” Asgore’s voice sounds skeptical. “What is it? Do you know where Frisk is?” 

“DOWN HERE, YOUR MAJESTY!” Papyrus shrieks, and before Asgore can turn the corner, he deploys his final weapon. He opens the box he has carried up to the mountain, and a figure, dressed immaculately in a three piece suit, a tiny top hat, skitters, panicked, into the darkness of the cell. It’s not enough to fool anyone for more than a second, but a second is all he needs. 

Asgore comes hurrying in, Gaster at his heels. Gaster shoots Papyrus a quick, panicked look, and then-

For once, the lights in their eyes meet, and Gaster finally sees him. 

Gaster _sees_ the pure, electric intelligence in his youngest son’s eyes, the creativity, the heroism, the resourcefulness that is so different from everyone else’s, so alien from his father’s own that Gaster had, long ago, discounted him as stupid. 

“Oh…” Gaster’s jaw drops open, but Asgore is already talking-

“Frisk! Papyrus, do you know where they are? Can you find Sans, get them far away-”

“THEY’RE…. THEY’RE IN THERE, MAJESTY.” Papyrus points a shaking finger at the final cell, the dark cell, past the grate that allows observation but refuses to allow escape, and as Asgore approaches, his eyes narrow slightly in suspicion. Behind his back, Gaster and Papyrus share the briefest look, but then-

In the rear corner of the cell, the briefest glimmer of movement, the glimpse of a pair of tiny tuxedo tails, and Asgore doesn’t think. He steps in.

“Frisk? Kiddo, can you come out and talk to your-”

He trails off at once as the cell door slams with the distinct sound of a lock falling into place, then turns slowly. 

“I AM SORRY, KING ASGORE! THE FATE OF THE UNIVERSE WAS AT STAKE!” Papyrus calls out, and Asgore groans as he finally recognizes the figure he’d chased into the cell. It is, of course, not Frisk. It is an elderly gray cat, dressed to the nines by a skeleton with clever fingers who just wanted you to have all your best friends at your wedding. 

Ghost, free from the carrier he despises so much, purrs. As Asgore sinks to a seat in disbelief, the old cat climbs up onto his lap and begins to purr. 

“Papyrus, Gaster, release me.” Asgore attempts, but his heart isn’t in it. 

“I’m sorry, m-majesty. But my son is right.” Gaster mutters. Asgore makes a low, frustrated sound, then paces to the bars of the cell.

“I am your king.” He whispers, ignoring the unhappy yowl of the cat who has just been displaced from his lap. 

“YES! BUT!” Papyrus says cheerfully. “I HAVE BEEN LISTENING TO MY FRIEND PETER’S CD FOR THE PAST FEW MONTHS, AND I THINK I’VE FIGURED OUT SOME PROBLEMS WITH A PURE MONARCHY!”

“Papyrus….” Asgore says warningly, but Papyrus is on a roll now. 

“THIS IS CALLED A REVOLUTION!” He says proudly. 

Next to him, his father begins to wheeze with incredulous, disbelieving laughter. Maybe he can't believe that Papyrus - stupid, worthless Papyrus - had just said that. 

Papyrus doesn't care. He's smarter than people realize, and it's fine if he's the only one to figure out that he's just saved everyone he's ever loved.


	168. SAVE the World

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [Wrexie's back for stream tonight, thank god.](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)

“He’s dead.” Undyne whispers numbly. “He died. Sans, he died-”

“i…” He hesitates. They’re back on the clifftop, where Undyne had hauled Asha and her mother after Cody had fallen. 

Died. 

Both Parekhs are clustered next to Toriel, Asha sobbing inconsolably, her mother gazing off into the middle distance with an utterly lost look on her face, and Sans wishes you were here - you would know what to say, surely, you would… he doesn’t know how he’s going to tell you. He can’t worry about that now.

“I didn’t save him. I wasn’t there in time.” Undyne is muttering, her eye open and large and glassy. She hadn’t cried yet, but Sans knew as soon as the shock wore off, it would come. 

“it wasn’t your fault.” He mutters, and stares off over the cliffside, down at the town. It’s swarming - the ground is literally writhing and he can see it all the way up here, and there’s mobs of humans, and as he watches, even, something explodes near the beach - was that the gas station - sending a cloud of fire and smoke up into the air. Several seconds later, the booming noise reaches them on a delay, and Undyne flinches, and the ground underneath them shakes. They can’t just stay up here. “...undyne, we-”

“I know.” She grunts. “I know. We gotta go. Town needs saving.”

“...town needs savin’.” He repeats quietly, and glances over his shoulder at the Parekhs. Mrs. Parekh is holding Asha so close, shaking slightly. Toriel is weeping. 

“Sans, I-” Undyne begins, brushing a stray tear impatiently away from her eye. 

“i know.” He says, blinking hard. “love you too, bud.” He reaches up and cuts two holes, one back to the monster development, the other to wherever that explosion was. They’ve got to go. 

He can’t help it. He glances over his shoulder, at the yawning mouth of the cave leading into the underground, the former site of the barrier, and he thinks of you and Frisk and Papyrus all down there, of Cap and Nat and Shadow… Undyne hasn’t moved either. She’s looking up, at the observation tower on the peak of Mt. Ebott. 

“They’re gonna be okay, right?” She whispers.

“of course.” He fakes the confidence. “but they need us to do our jobs.” 

“Yeah.” She mutters, swallows hard, and then squares her shoulders and walks through her portal. Sans braces himself for just a second, holds his phone tight in his hand, and then steps through into a world of fire and screams and chaos and fear and violence, fearing in his heart that nothing he can do here will be enough.  
\--------------------------------

In the hour or so since the ground started to shake, Dr. Stanley’s vet’s office has descended into utter chaos. He doesn’t know how the monsters knew to find him, but they did, clearly. They did.

“I need more thread, please.” He mutters to Lesser Dog. L.D. had arrived first, only seconds after Dr. Stanley had made his way back inside with the young woman he’d managed to save from her human assailant. Lesser Dog been escorted by a monster that Dr. Stanley had never seen before (he assumed), a tall, imposing figure obscured almost entirely by a hooded robe. 

“You are the helper? The one who cares for all creatures?” The monster had asked, and the vet hesitated for a second, then nodded. “Good.” The monster had whispered. “I am the Riverperson. I will bring help. I will bring those who need help.” The monster seemed to hesitate for a second, then nodded at the dog cowering behind them. “I have brought you a good boy.” The Riverperson said quietly, and then, abruptly, they had vanished. For a second, L.D. and the vet had simply stared at each other.

“Okay.” He’d muttered. “Let’s do our best, boy.” 

L.D. was helping. He brings Dr. Stanley more thread - in his paws, clumsily fit into rubber gloves, seemingly understanding the need for sterility. Dr. Stanley nods his thanks, threading a new needle and getting started on the next gash on the flank of the bear monster he’s tending to. 

“Dr. Stanley-” The young woman who’d tried to stop the maniac with the tire iron bursts into the exam room. Her name is Alexa, and she is tall and blonde and would probably be glamorous if she weren’t in his borrowed scrubs, covered in blood. She didn’t know much about medicine, but she knew CPR for humans and she was helping. 

“More injured?” He asks, dreading the answer. 

“Lots.” She squeaks. 

“Triage. Most severe first.” He says distractedly, finishing his stitches and looking at the bear monster. She hesitates, eyes glassy, then dashes back towards the waiting room. He turns his attention back to the bear. “I am afraid I can’t stay with you longer.” He says, slightly horrified. He would normally never leave a patient in this condition - there are still wounds requiring stitching - but the bear monster won’t bleed out at this rate, and he can already hear the sound of ragged groans from the new arrivals. 

“It’s okay. Go.” The bear growls through gritted teeth, and Dr. Stanley hurries to the waiting room. 

The Riverperson has brought many more injured. They’re running out of room in the waiting room, and Alexa is on her knees next to a small fish monster he thinks he recognizes, but-

“Too late.” The fish is gurgling. “Body died already. Help someone else…” She trails off, and Dr. Stanley stares for a second, horrified, before the fish's’ body crumbles into dust. A low moan of horror erupts around the room as the injured humans and monsters witness this, and a little Temmie screams,

“Shyren!” 

Dr. Stanley has only just enough time to process this - she’s been on TV, he _knows her_ \- before he notices a sheep monster practically discolored red and pink with blood, and there’s a human with a broken arm, a greenstick fracture with the bone actually jutting out of the skin, and a Tsunderplane, oh god, how do you treat an Tsunderplane with a _gunshot_ wound, and it’s just him and Alexa who doesn’t know medicine and L.D. and he is panicking now, his hands are shaking and he feels so utterly hopeless-

“Um.” A little voice speaks up near him, and he turns, looking down at a strange monster he’s never seen before. “Riverperson sent me to help.” The monster mutters. “I’m pretty good when I try.” He doesn’t make eye contact with the vet, but he demonstrates - he reaches out with a hand on an appendage that is more tentacle than arm, grabs the human’s broken arm (prompting a scream of pain) and closes his watery little eyes, and then - 

The arm, abruptly, is healed. 

Dr. Stanley studies the little monster for a moment, flabbergasted. 

“What’s your name?” He finally asks.

“Jerry.” The monster replies, almost stubbornly. 

“Jerry.” Dr. Stanley repeats, takes a deep breath, then mutters, “I am so glad you’re here.” 

Jerry stares up at Dr. Stanley in absolute, utter disbelief for a long, long moment.

“Cool.” He finally whispers. 

They get back to work.  
\------------------------------------------

“You were wondering when I’d show up?” Capra scoffs. “What the everloving dick, creepy ghost kid?! You don’t even know who I am!”

“Oh, but I do. I’ve been down here for more than long enough to have figured you out entirely.” Chara says, beginning to clumsily climb the mountain of dust that Flowey has erupted out of, with all the grace of a seven year old. “The Underground is where I’m stuck, after all. Once the barrier fell, I was able to at least explore a little. EbbCo is interesting.” They say in their little, reedy voice. “It was fun to watch, for a while. You were fun to watch.”

“...I find that I really don’t like you.” Capra mutters. “Christ, kid. Just… stop!”

“I’m making this all stop.” Chara sighs patiently, finally reaching the top of the pile of dust. They plop down, crosslegged, leaning against Flowey’s - Asriel’s - god, it must be his root system, this far down. Maybe just a root. Fuck, how big _was_ the monster? “But yes. I knew you would come. Arrogant. Convinced of your own intelligence even when it is clearly and obviously lacking. And, as expected… alone.” 

“Okay. One: Fuck you. Two… shouldn’t you be, I don’t know… listening to me?” Capra growls, staring at the little kid and feeling utterly helpless. Normally, a big plan would be occurring to him. Right now, he’s got jack shit. 

“I’m so much stronger than you.” Chara replies airily. “I have Dennis’ magic. I have the Dust. And… all of that is child’s play, really -”

“YOU’RE LITERALLY A CHILD!” Capra snaps, and Chara giggles.

“No. I am determination. I am the part of a human that refused to die.” They laugh. “And right now… I am LOVE.” 

“Shit acronym-”

“Perhaps. But…” Chara grins, and their teeth gleam whiter than is rational in this dark cave. “Your friends can’t stop it. I can feel them trying, but… oh,” they place a hand on the root they’re leaning against, “I can feel it all. There’s so much more violence then they can possibly halt. How can they? They can fight back, but that only makes more violence for me. I’ve almost got enough, now. It’s coming in faster than I know what to do with it. You’re a mage. Can’t you feel it? Close your eyes. Reach out.” Chara commands, and he obeys. He has to.

He can feel it, suddenly. It’s a hot wave, a rippling of red hatred and fear and violence that is funneling towards Chara, but he can feel it so far away. It’s everywhere, and it’s everything, and it’s all over the town, and it can’t be stopped. 

“Oh. Fuck me. That is… not great.” He whispers. 

They chuckle, then glance up, surprised, at the sound of two more sets of feet. “Hm. Apparently not alone.” They say, standing up uneasily on the shifting mountain of Dust and squinting towards the entrance to this chamber, looking somewhat amused when Nat and Shadow arrive. “Oh. Just you. The… explorers.” They say, then look back at Capra. “I should have known the only friends here with you would be ones you bought-”

“Hey, excuse you, I made friends with him BEFORE he started paying me!” Nat, slightly out of breath, snaps, then glances at Shadow.

“And he’s a good boss!” Shadow surprises both Nat and Capra by barking out with sudden vehemence and obvious sincerity. 

“Huh.” Chara mutters, blinking, and for a moment, it’s possible to pretend that this is a normal child, a seven year old like any other, but then they laugh again. “Well. Doesn’t matter. It’s time. Seeya.”

“What? Fuck! No!” Capra snarls, but the cavern is suddenly illuminated in brutal red light as Chara takes a breath and then steps forward, beginning to rise slowly from the ground as the vestiges of their appearance are finally torn away. They are no longer human, they are simply pulsating red energy, they are determination, they are violence, and they are beginning to rend reality. The ground starts to shake again, but this is different, it’s a hum, a vibration, and they can all feel that hum in the air now as every single atom of everything snaps to attention.

“Oh.” Nat whispers.

“Oh.” Capra confirms, eyes wide, drenched in red light and feeling the power pulse through him and -

Isn’t this some _goddamn bullshit_ , though? That the strongest power on earth, in existence was just violence, was just some shitty humans lashing out, out of fear, out of disgust, out of sheer panic? This was **it** , the thing that could rend the universe, unspool it atom by atom, just so that all the hurting would finally stop for this terrible, tormented … god, this kid?

“I love you.” Shadow whispers to Nat. 

“I love you too.” Nat replies, and again it floats through his mind, that shitty acronym, Level of Violence, where’s the fucking E, he can barely stand it, he’s downright indignant, and then-

“Oh. Shit.”

Something has occurred to him. 

For a second he rejects it, because it’s too fucking tacky, it’s too fucking Fifth Element, but of course, of course there’s a stronger power than this level of violence bullshit. He knows that stronger power. 

It’s spent the last few months kicking his ass.

He closes his eyes, and he reaches out again, but this time he knows what he’s looking for and - oh fuck -

There is a beam of love - not that acronym shit, real _love_ that is tearing down through the mountain, directly into his soul, and he feels that first, and the feeling is like touching the barrier but twentyfold, a hundredfold, a thousandfold - and he is electrified with white light and energy and power and peace, and he knows that love, that’s HIS, that’s him and that’s Mettaton, and then abruptly he realizes that it’s... everywhere, he can zoom out, he can see how it’s twisted through the world and it’s everywhere!

It is in a grieving family on the cliffside, and a mother, a queen who yearns to protect everything and everyone. 

It is in the heart of a king in a dark cell, screaming with the need to help his people because he has taken on an impossible duty out of love.

It is in a skeleton admiring his son, and another skeleton admiring his favorite cat, and his brother - he finds Sans and again, he is almost awash with power as it spiderwebs out and back, to Papyrus, to Undyne and Alphys, to him(!), and god, god, so much to you ---

And then there is you, somewhere distant but still accessible, and fuck, it’s almost too much, just between you and the Dot is almost too much, forget you and Sans, you and Frisk, you and Undyne, and you, you love him too, and he loves you because you’re his _family_ -

And there is Undyne again, locked in desperate battle against a horde of furious humans, impossible odds, and she loves Alphys, she loves you, she loves her people, she loves Cody and she mourns and she loves and she shows her love through her bravery, tears streaming down her face, and he follows her love again to Alphys, god, Alphys, clever Alphys, brilliant Alphys, Alphys who is fretting and worrying and thinking about the egg inside of her and trying so damn hard save the world-

It is everywhere he looks.

It is an old veterinarian desperately trying to make a difference.

A young married couple standing shoulder by shoulder, one human, one monster, refusing to be moved.

An old woman in front of an aquarium, protecting the creatures she still feels responsible for. 

His fucking lawyer, a blur of claws and motion and desperate energy. 

A bartender quelling fires, even as humans try to extinguish him, his daughter by his side. 

Jerry - even Jerry.

His interns, Nat and Shadow, yes, but also Alexa and Dave and Kenji and Corona, each in their own private fights, and so many humans, so many monsters, so many children and - holy fuck, then he finds the dogs, not even the monster dogs, just your standard issue dogs and that wave of love from them is so ridiculous he almost laughs, but through all of that there is just-

Mettaton

Mettaton would be enough.

There is a higher power than LOVE.

It has a way less shitty acronym. 

He looks up at the ball of determination and violence and rage and hurt, and he whispers,“Chara. Be at peace.”

There is a gasp, a feeling like a thousand candles sputtering out, and the world stops falling apart, just like that. 

Chara breathes in another sob, a tiny child once again, that little seven year old that knows nothing but hurt, and then they whisper,

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Be at rest. You’re free.” Capra says.

Chara blinks, looking skyward, and for a second, they are illuminated in sunlight that can’t reach this far down, and then they slowly fade from existence.

The pain is over, and they are free, and…

Capra turns, looking at his slack jawed, disbelieving interns, and he clears his throat. It takes another long moment for him to find the right words. Finally, he decides.

“ _...Did you guys even SEE that shit?!!!!_ ”


	169. Hopes and Dreams

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [Come hang out at stream](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)

Shadow and Nat stare blankly at Capra. He grins triumphantly back. A long moment passes, then another, then-

“...Yeah.” Shadow tries out, then clears his throat. “Though. Uh. _What?_ ”

“I am a really spectacularly good wizard and that’s all you need to know.” He says primly. “Fuck Gandalf the Great. I am Gandalf the … _super-goddamn-great._ Wait. Don’t use that one. I can do better. Hang on.” Nat eyes him a moment longer, then groans. 

“You’re going to be insufferable at work, huh?” 

“YUP.” He says cheerfully, then turns back to look at the center of the room. “But that’s tomorrow’s problem. Right now, all that matters is that we are down one creepy ghost kid. Reality is saved. Town is saved.” Something suddenly occurs to him. “Town is saved, right?” 

“Uh.” Shadow says, nodding to draw Capra’s attention to the scene over his shoulder. Right. Massive vine twisting out of a pile of dead monsters. Well. Dead monster dust. He was trying not to think about that bit, because it made him queasy. As he looks, the vine thrashes once, weakly, and there’s a rumbling sound, like something shifting. A rock the size of Capra’s foot drops from the ceiling about ten feet away from them, and then-

“Aw, _jeez._ ” Nat yelps, throwing out both arms and charging forward, catching both Capra and Shadow off guard. The three of them stumble closer to the center of the chamber, moments before a falling stalactite the size of a barrel (but significantly pointier) crashes onto the floor of the cave. 

“Okay, yeah, I don’t love that.” Capra grunts, while Shadow, wide eyed, scans the ceiling for more falling dangers and Nat groans, rubbing her knee. “Hey.” He turns and addresses the vine. “Uh. Kid. Plant-kid. Asriel.”

Silence.

Okay. Good thing you were a dopeass wizard hopped up on lovejuice, huh, Pete?

When he told this story, he made a note, he would not call it “lovejuice.” 

“Kid. Talk to me.” He demands - he’s getting better at that, he’s understanding the difference between a command that can be thoroughly ignored and one that had to be listened to, and while the latter still gives him the screaming willies, right now it is kind of a necessary evil, since he’s not entirely into the whole getting skewered by a stalactite thing.

There’s a moment of silence, and then sickly, diseased looking flowers begin to thrash forth from the mess of plantlife, each sporting a tiny face that begins - oh, fuck, that begins to scream in utter pain and horror.

“Shit!” He barks out, restraining the urge to cover his ears. Shadow yowls - his ears are much more sensitive - and Nat instantly wrenches her hand away from her twisted knee to cover her boyfriend’s ears as much as possible. “Kid! No more screaming, okay?” He puts some force into it this time, but, to his horror, it doesn’t really seem to stick. Half the flowers shut up, but the others continue shrieking, albeit at a slightly subdued volume. “Hey. Hey. Asriel.” What does he know about the monster? Well, he knew one thing. He was about twenty square miles too big. “Pull back. You’re a shapeshifter, right? Get smaller!” He yells over the sound of screaming flowers.

“T-”  
“Try-”  
“Tr-”  
“t”  
“TRYING.” Several of the non-screaming flowers screech, in a tiny, scared, child’s voice.

“Well, uh…” He takes stock of the situation, and a few more rocks plummet from the roof.

“Hurtt-” A flower whispers.  
“dying-” Another agrees, shriveling even as it forces the word out.

“Well, try harder!” He commands desperately, noticing the sickly color of the vine now.

“Too”  
“Toooo”  
“Weak.” The flowers moan in agony.

“Oh.” Capra mutters, taking stock of this. “Oh, shit.” Shit, he had done this in the wrong order, hadn’t he? Because Chara had been feeding Asriel enough power to be everywhere at once, be everything at once, but now Chara was gone, and that was one trick Capra sure as hell couldn’t do, his shiny-ass soul did basically one thing, he told people what to do, but he couldn’t make someone do the impossible, couldn’t get blood from a stone.

“What do we do?” Shadow growls, still visibly in pain from the noise. “If - oh - if he dies, if he… I mean, if he… Dusts…”

“Shadow, please…” Nat begs, looking horrified. “He’s… I think he’s just a kid-”

“But you heard him. He’s through the whole city. He’s everywhere. If he just turns to Dust… the whole city-”

“-Is built on top of these goddamn caves because humans are SHIT at planning infrastructure longterm!” Capra spits, then ducks as another few rocks - pebbles really - rain down on his head. “Shit. Shit. This whole town could turn into a sinkhole. Oh… fuck.” This sinks in. “Oh fuck, and some caves have magma, and… oh. Fuck.” He closes his eyes as more dirt and rocks rain from the ceiling, trying to think. “Asriel. Buddy.” He finally mutters. “You gotta hang on as long as you possibly can, okay?” 

There is a terrible silence as all the remaining shrieking flowers suddenly wilt and fall, and for a second, Capra is certain that it is too late. But no. One flower still remains.

“Okay.” Asriel whispers. “I’ll… try.”

“Well, what _is_ the plan, then?” Nat demands.

“We wait.” Capra says, keeping his eyes on the ceiling, waiting for the next collapse.

“Wait?!” Shadow says indignantly. “Wait for what?!”

Capra bites his lip, glancing towards the door to the chamber just as another colossal grinding sound happens. The tunnel connecting this cave to the rest of the ruins begins to collapse inwardly, and he winces.

He’d better be right about this.

“They’re coming.” He says, and he wills himself to believe it. 

\--------------------------------------------------

“Ready, bud?” You breathe. Frisk nods.

The ground rumbles underneath you.

You examine the small, heavy device in your hand one last time.

You press the button.

Okay, so you’d come back from the future to give… you… this machine, and thank god, it had been an idiot proof machine, just the one button, no option to mess it up. You’ll need to thank Alphys when you see her again, you think, then wince - that’s just the kind of thing that people think in books when they’re thinking about someone who’s totally going to die!

You have a millisecond to think about how stupid that line of thought is before you’re distracted. The already-too-heavy device suddenly becomes much too heavy to hold. You yelp, jerking back and pulling Frisk with you, but the machine is already at work, growing, twisting upward and outward in such a dizzying way that you have a tough time understanding what you’re seeing.

It’s like… it’s like in cartoons, when someone paints a tunnel on a cliff and then walks right into the tunnel. From the side, it’s just a metal frame, twice the size of a hula hoop, but facing it dead on… that’s not the illusion of a tunnel, that’s an actual portal, like a thousand thousand thousand shortcuts all stacked up on top of each other. Maybe that’s what it actually is - the tunnel is a kaleidoscope of different colors, reds, greens, browns, sky blue, and you think that if you stare at a portion long enough, you can begin to make sense of it-

 **”We gotta go.”** Frisk demands your attention. You snap to alertness. 

“Yeah. You’re right.” 

You wish you could see the other side of the tunnel. You’d feel much better about this if you could. You turn to Frisk, patting your back (practically bare, because - against all odds - this was still all playing out with you in your wedding dress). “Hop up.” Frisk gives you an indignant look, and you squint right back at them. “Hey, chump.” You say, trying to sound tough, and wave your skarm meaningfully. “Last time I touched the side of a portal I didn’t understand, I got the skarm. Do _you_ want a skeleton foot? Or like.. butt?”

Frisk hesitates, then nods eagerly. You groan. 

“Tough cookies. Hop up.” Frisk sighs, but clambers around behind you, and you bend - oof, you are _too_ pregnant for this - grabbing their legs as they sit piggyback on you. “Okay. Don’t… touch anything.” You mutter, and spare one hand, once you’re certain they’re on, to hike up the hem of your skirt, feeling relieved at least that you’d worn sneakers. “Here we go.” You say, then hesitate, just for a second. 

You wish Sans was here. Just…

It would be fine. 

You grit your teeth, and then step through that metal hula hoop, into the whirling tunnel and - oh, thank god, your feet do not turn into skeleton feet. 

...Oh, god, would that be skeet?

You don’t have time to worry about that, because suddenly, you and Frisk are _moving_ You’ve barely taken a few steps in the tunnel, but you are being hurtled forward with enough force to blow your hair back and make Frisk duck slightly for cover. Still, even with the speed, it feels like the two of you are walking for - for quite some time, but could it really be quite some time? Your feet never tire, your shoulders never weary of carrying your cousin, you just walk, and the colors in the tunnel begin to fade,first gradually, then rapidly, until everything around you, even Frisk, even you, is bathed in a muted sepia.

There is something like music, you hear it now, not in your ears, but in your soul, and Frisk hears it too, because they shift anxiously on your shoulders, craning their head, and then-

Your speed grinds to a halt as the end of the tunnel comes into view, and you stumble forward, just a little, catching yourself just in time from falling onto… soft green grass. Yellow flowers.

Frisk slides from your shoulders as you look around, blinking in the dim light, your hair beginning to stand on end as you feel something familiar. You know this room, though it’s darker now, warmer… a child’s hobbyhorse lies haphazardly in the corner of the cave-

The garden-

For a second, your mind stumbles, and you picture a throne looming somewhere in the back, a desk, a record player, but then you blink and it’s just shrubbery, hedges and bushes in the dim light, a trellis and that hum of power that resonates through you - the barrier. Again, the barrier. You were here, and the barrier was here, and…

Footsteps.

Down the hall, down where you know the barrier must be, enormous, heavy footsteps echo, but strangely, as they grow closer, they also seem to grow quieter. You blink, nonplussed and stunned, but Frisk seems to understand what’s happening first, because they grab your hand and pull, and you blindly follow them, ducking behind two conveniently placed shrubs. Though, of course, that was kind of beside the point - how could you hide when the tunnel your machine had made was still jutting impossibly into this room, looking just as colorful and kaleidoscopic now that you had emerged on the other side, back before…

“Oh. Oh no.” You whisper, processing _when_ you must be shortly before you bear witness yourself. 

A tiny monster, battered, bleeding, sobbing, is hauling a shape so still and limp that you instantly just _know_ it’s a corpse, it’s dead, it’s…

Well. They’re not exactly dead.

Asriel is just as tiny as Chara was, and he’s so desperately hurt, and for a moment, you nearly scream out for help, but then you remember no, no, that’s not how this went, that’s not how this goes, they both die…

Even as you’re thinking this, Asriel collapses on the soft ground in front of your tunnel, letting out a tiny, weary bleat.

“S-sorry…” He mumbles to himself, his eyes fixing glassily on the rainbow whirl of your tunnel back to the future.

What do you do?

What can you do?

Had you brought yourself, brought Frisk back here so that you could watch this tiny child die? You glance over at Frisk, but to your horror, Frisk is no longer crouching behind their bush. They’re hurrying forward, mouth pressed shut with furious determination as they kneel by the side of the little goat.

 **”Asriel, please. Please don’t go!”** They demand, and Asriel rolls his head back to look up at Frisk, uncomprehending, and you brace yourself for the world to unravel, because there was only one rule, but it was a big one - you don’t fuck with the past and get caught.

“I’m… s-sorry.” Asriel breathes out again, and reaches up to Frisk. “Chara…”

 **”No! No, it’s me, it’s Frisk!”** Frisk insists, but it’s too late. Even as you stand there, just now beginning to stumble out from behind the shrub, Asriel begins to crumble.

You gasp, running up to Frisk’s side as the physical form of Asriel fades away, drifting apart, atom by atom, horrified. Frisk yelps in distress, looking back at you with tears in their eyes, but then you both look back at the dying monster, and you see it.

Shimmering outside Asriel’s… god, his Dust… for a heartbeat, it’s there…

A perfect green soul. 

You freeze, your mind whirling with impossibilities. Oh god, oh god, could you… could you fix this? Could this be repaired? Could you do anything - did you have anything, any skill, any-

Frisk has not frozen. They simply do not think, because they are an innate mage that has more potential than anyone has ever reckoned with before. They reach out, and they grab the soul and it quivers, wavers, and then it _stays_. Wrapped in Frisk’s hands, it stays.

Frisk has gone vacant, eyes focused on something only they can see, and you think of what it was like just to touch Sans’ soul, what Frisk must be feeling right now, and it snaps you out of your horror, because at last, at last you have a plan. 

“Hold on tight to that, Frisk.” You whisper, grabbing your cousin (and, by proxy, the soul) up under one arm and hiking your dress up once again with the other before you hurtle back into the tunnel, back into your own time, with one very precious bit of cargo. 

You know what you’re going to do now.

You’re going to save the goat.

\-----------------------------------------

“Shit, shit, shit, shit… come on, Asriel, hang tight! Just a little longer!” Capra cries out, ducking another stalactite. Things are falling fast and hard now, and he’s been split up from Nat and Shadow, and it’s like a goddamn bullet-hell game in here, except, oh god, he can’t fuck up.

Asriel-the-plant doesn’t respond. He can’t. His flower wilted long ago, and he’s crumbling, there’s no avoiding that. Slowly but surely…

He grits his teeth, then grabs his phone. This could very well be his last shot. Across the cave, there’s a heavy sounding thunk and Nat cries out in pain. 

“You alright?!” Capra yells.

“Not! Really!” She yells tensely. Shit, he can’t even see her, it’s too dark and there’s dust and Dust and-

“It’s her leg! She can’t move!” Shadow sounds panicked.

“Drag her then! Keep her safe!” Capra demands, then, keeping his eyes on the ceiling, he types-

 _Sorry, Threep. Love you._

There is another rumble, and this time even the floor moves, and he nearly presses send, then he scowls and tucks the phone back in his pocket. He’ll come up with something. He’s got - he’s got fucking force field shoes, he could give those to Shadow and Nat, and him, maybe he could climb this fucking beanstalk of a deadass shapeshifter goat flower kid and he could, he could-

There’s a gust of wind, and suddenly light streams into the cave, and you and Frisk are there, emerging from a shortcut, and he bursts out in nearly hysterical laughter. 

“Oh, thank god.” He croaks. “I had nothing.”

“Chara?!” You yell, already scrambling forward, Frisk in your arms, and something, something in Frisk’s arms…

“Gone!” He yells back. You’re nearly by the edge of the mountain of Dust when Frisk suddenly leaps from your arms. Wordlessly, they scramble forwards, and the something in their hands grows brighter and brighter, a piercing, lime green that makes him think of spring, of new growth and then-

It vanishes, and Frisk presses their hands tight against the vine.

“Frisk, what are you doing?!” You yell out.

**”He needs magic! He needs more power! Can you-”**

“Oh!” You suddenly sprint forward, scaling the grizzly pile of Dust, and you press your palms flat against the vine as well, and for a long moment, there is nothing. No more falling rocks, no more rumbling, just perfect silence, punctuated by a soft sniff from Nat, a labored breath from you.

You begin to sway first. Capra sees this and runs forward, scaling the pile - is it shrinking? - in just enough time to catch you, as you fall back, drenched in sweat, but with a vague, triumphant look on your face. Frisk falls to their knees a few seconds later, their eyes screwed shut, shaking, but they are beaming, positively radiant.

“What-” Capra begins.

“ _Look._ ” You demand, raising a hand.

The cracking and crumbling of the enormous root is vanishing, as green magic, like new growth, like sap, begins to patch and make repairs in Asriel’s massive, shifting form. There is a sound like a million sighs of relief, then something much smaller - a hiccuping, tearful laugh, and the vines twist apart just a little, and inside, cocooned, is a tiny goat monster with a look of fierce determination on his face. 

“It’ll be okay.” Asriel whispers. “I can do this. Slow.” He murmurs, before Capra has the chance to remind him. 

“Slow.” Capra confirms. “Whole town needs you to do this right, bud.” 

“I can do it.” Asriel repeats, then goes distant, that far-off, determined look on his face.

“It’s gonna be okay.” You whisper, not to Capra, just holding your belly tight through your torn, bloody, Dust-stained wedding dress. Frisk pushes shakily up onto their feet and moves, scrambles and collapses next to you. “I should… I should call S-”

“i’m here.” Capra doesn’t even start at the skeleton’s unexpected voice, just sags with relief for a moment. Sans looks much the worse for wear - like the rest of them - but he is fixed on a singular purpose, and he moves to take Capra’s place, supporting you. As Capra gets up to go check on Nat and Shadow, Sans catches his forearm, giving it the briefest clasp in wordless gratitude, and that’s almost enough to make Capra break down in hysterics, trying to process the past ten minutes, the past day, the past weekend, the past goddamn year, but then he nods back and hurries over to Shadow and a very pale Nat, her leg… oh, that didn’t look great, but they could fix it, they had time now to fix it.

“It’s gonna be okay.” He hears you whisper to Sans, and he nods vaguely, stripping off his tux jacket to fashion a tourniquet, something to stop the bleeding from Nat’s leg until you and Sans were ready to move her. Heroism, he was rapidly discovering, often seemed to have a pretty damn painful aftermath on the part of the heroes. Still..

He looks back at the ever so slowly shrinking plant, at you and Frisk and Sans and the baby-in-progress, at Asriel’s eyes shining fiercely within the vines, and then back at Nat and Shadow, the latter smoothing her hair back, murmuring promises in her ear, and for a moment, he can almost picture it again, that love, the real shit, tying everyone in this room together, twisting in knots and flaring like a hundred supernovas and he believes it. 

It’s gonna be okay.


	170. Good Night

The scene, at the top of the mountain, is chaos.

You sway, gripping weakly onto Sans’ tuxedo jacket, distractedly grabbing little bits of magic from the air around you. That’s what Frisk did, after all, that’s what they do, it’s just hard. You’re unpracticed and it’s hard. It’s necessary, though. People’ll need you to make shortcuts later, you know that. You just need to… you just need to get on your feet. 

Nat and Cap and Shadow have already gone through a shortcut, so Toriel can do the healing that Nat so desperately needed. You hope they’ve gotten her there in time. You hadn’t been able to leave so quickly. You and Frisk and Sans had waited. And waited. And waited. Until finally, at long last, it was time to emerge from the cave where so much had started.

Frisk is holding Sans’ hand. And you, in your skeleton hand, you have the paw of a little goat monster. Asriel is glancing around, shifting nervously from foot to foot, his eyes very wide as he takes in all the blood, all the destruction, all the… outside-ness of it all. 

“It’s not always like this out here, Asriel.” You whisper, squeezing his paw. “You’ll be okay out here.”

“O...kay.” He says tentatively, not looking like he really believes it. He’s different, with his soul firmly back in his chest. He’s looking around like things are new, like all this is totally fresh, and you realize that he really is a kid again. He must remember the things he’d seen as Flowey, the things he’d witnessed even today, but it’s not like you’re holding the paw of a creature of staggering power, not right now. He feels like a… damn it, like a normal little kid who’s seen too much. 

“look.” Sans mutters. “in the tent.” He nods, and you see the large form of the monster you’re looking for, bent over a bleeding otter monster, her nose wrinkled in concentration. She reaches out, weary, placing both hands on the monster’s chest, holds there for a moment, then sags. Asriel observes this with wide eyes, then looks up at you. 

“I should… she won’t want…” He trails off, because at that moment, as if feeling the eyes on her, Toriel glances up and over at you. For a second, she stands stock still, transfixed, as if she can’t possibly believe what she’s seeing.

Frisk will have none of that. They tug free from Sans, and grab Asriel’s other paw, yanking them forward at a run, but Toriel lets out a shocked bellow, something more animal than anything else, and she charges forward and, oh, woe betide anyone who stands in her way as she gathers them up, tears already beginning to flow from her eyes.

“How?” She whispers, one hand already distractedly smoothing Asriel’s fur, feeling his ears, his little horns. “How?”

Asriel lets out a little sniffle, looking at Frisk, both still crushed in their mother’s embrace. Frisk manages a tiny shrug and looks at you. Tori follows the glance, and takes in you and Sans, still in your wedding finery, much the worse for wear, just holding each other up now that you’ve been relieved of your charges, now that the worst is over. You can still hear sirens, you know the streets are still probably scattered with the last, most bullheaded human rioters, the most resilient and stubborn monsters, but it’s over. You’ve done it and it’s over. 

“How can I…. you…” Toriel tries again, and Sans sucks in a painful sounding breath. He’s been battered in the fighting. Almost everyone has.

“tori…” He says wearily, and reaches up to push a piece of hair that’s been matted to your forehead free. “are we… can we be married now?”

“Please?” You agree quietly. Toriel blinks, another few heavy tears falling from her eyes, and then she nods slowly, hugging Frisk and Asriel even closer, until they both begin to squirm. 

“thanks.” Sans whispers, and you turn to him, to your husband, and kiss him, squeezing him tight, and for just that moment, everything is perfect, and neither of you are tired or hurting or shaking and everything is fine, and you know, you know that everything will be fine, that the tears and screams and blood all around you will be forgotten or mended or soothed, that you will go home and you will be made whole again, that everyone will be made whole again, not now, not yet, but someday. You love him and he loves you and the two of you will be together, and your family will be together, and that’s enough. That’s enough. 

Finally, the moment passes, and you inch away reluctantly, and the two of you meet each others’ eyes, and, not releasing each other’s hands, you turn, surveying the scene below you. 

“firefighters need help by the dock.” Sans says.

“Okay. Dock first, then we should check the mall. Asriel said it got bad there.”

“ok.” Sans whispers, leans up and kisses you quickly once more, and then the two of you step forward into a shortcut that he pulls up, you still trying to concentrate on sponging up magic the way that Frisk does.

There’s work to be done. 

\-------------------------------------------------

“Come on. This isn’t really in the godfather responsibility list. I’m just supposed to like, I don’t know, buy her a Firebolt when she’s in her third year.” Capra groans, and you glare at him.

“This is on you. You find her.”

“She’s your kid!”

“You taught hide and go seek to a two-year-old. A two year old _shapeshifter._ FIND HER.” You snap, hiding your smile, and he sighs, trudging back into the kitchen and following the sound of Dot’s soft giggles. You grumble, settling back into the recliner, and Nat, on the opposite couch (underneath an extremely elderly, quietly purring cat), raises her eyebrows. 

“You’re not worried?” She says. “A year ago, you’d have been in full freakout if you lost her.”

“A year ago, she wasn’t giving herself away by going into giggle fits when she turned into something weird. Besides. Eh. She’s in a phase. Bet you ten bucks she turned into-”

“She was a chair!” Capra calls out, and you shrug, grinning as he grumbles and a moment or two later returns to the family room with a squirming mostly-skeleton in his arms, depositing her on your lap. “This is yours.” He sighs. 

“Thank you.” You say primly, then look at Dot. “Buddy, why do you keep doing that?”

“Funny!” She replies with another peal of giggles, and you sigh, trying not to snicker. 

“Yeah, yeah. Just saying, you never pull that stunt on Uncle Mettaton or Aunt Alphys and… and she’s off. Great.” You sigh as she jumps off your lap and tears back in the direction of the kitchen. “She’ll be a ladle next or something-”

“Don’t give her ideas.” Capra warns. “Want me to-”

“Nah.” You’re listening for the sound of mayhem, so you catch the low laugh first, then the screech of delight. “Her dad just got home.”

Sans walks into the family room a moment later, crouched over and holding hands with a fully docile little girl - now almost entirely human - who is babbling to him about her day. “hey babe. hey nat! how’s the new leg?” He asks, looking Nat over. 

“Eh. It’s fine. Alphys still won’t give me the gun leg from Planet Terror, but we did some upgrades this morning.” Nat swings the robot leg up onto the coffee table, and shows off how she can wiggle five robotic toes now. She’d adjusted pretty rapidly to losing the last one, but then, between Alphys and Mettaton, she’d had a lot of help with the replacement. “Shadow says hi and sorry he couldn’t come but something about his cousin and kittens and-”

“yeah, i gotcha.” Sans snorts, picking up Dot and kind of wriggling his way into the recliner you’re currently occupying, until somehow he’s taking up most of it. “he didn’t really have fond memories of him, anyway.” 

“Well, that wasn’t anyone’s fault but Dennis’.” You sigh, then snicker as he wraps his free arm around you. “Babe, stop getting comfy, we gotta go soon. Mettaton’s already there, and so are Undyne and Alphys and Haruhi. Is Papyrus coming with us, or-”

“no, he’s still in parliament, i texted him. he says he’ll meet us up once the floor debate is over. he’s bringing asgore and dad though, so, you know, get ready for two moody old guys in addition to alexander hamilbone.” Sans cracks, using one of his new favorite nicknames for the freshly-minted politician in your family. 

“That’ll never stop being weird, just by the way.” Capra drawls. You ignore him. 

“Well, then let’s get moving.” You groan, getting to your feet, and then give Dot a stern look. “Promise to be good?” She hesitates, looking around the room with big, beautiful eyes. Well, you certainly thought they were beautiful, even if she couldn't decide what kind of eyes she wanted for longer than a half hour.

“Pwomise.” She finally decides, and Cap breathes a sigh of relief. Sans clambers up too, swinging Dot back onto the ground. and Nat hops to her feet with a grunt. Capra’s phone buzzes, and he glances at it before saying,

“Meet you guys there in a sec. Mettaton forgot his hairbrush-”

“god forbid-”

“and it’s windy out there, so…” Capra shrugs, then trots towards the direction of their room. 

Cap and Mettaton never had ended up moving out. Neither, for that matter, had Undyne and Alphys. Or Papyrus. Or even Lesser Dog. It just, everyone had eventually decided, worked better this way. Especially with Dot and Haruhi in the mix, it was easier, everyone had mutually, tacitly decided. You were a family, after all. 

This family stuck together.

It’s not even a walk to your destination, really. It’s right next door. After all the horrors had come to light, after the human government and the new monster democracy had both searched through Dennis’ old house, it had been mutually decided the plan of action was to tear it to the ground. There had been too many horrors to keep it standing.

It had been Capra’s idea, first, what to do with the space. He and Papyrus had worked on a proposal, secured funding, Mettaton had gotten the publicity, Alphys had worked on the design, Undyne and Lawyerpants and Toriel and Asha, and Mrs. Parekh and… well, god, and so many others had worked on the programming and now…

You gaze proudly at the crowd that’s gathered for the ribbon cutting at the Cody Parekh Center for Human and Monster Unity, at the building that’s replaced Dennis’ old house of nightmares. It’s almost equally humans and monsters in attendance, and that seems right, deep down. Asha is wearing a pretty white dress and chasing Frisk through the community garden, both cackling, while M.K. and Asriel (who are Too Cool for these antics, now that they’re ten) lean back against the outdoor fitness space. Toriel’s watching them from the corner of her eye, pretending that she’s not, and passing Jerry a sandwich from a large buffet table. A small stage has been erected, and Undyne is busily working on setting up microphones, while the MC is probably hiding in the building until he gets - yup, Capra goes jogging past you, hairbrush in hand. 

You smile, greeting old friends as you find your reserved seats near the front, behind Cody’s extended family. Mrs. Parekh looks nervous, but Dr. Stanley, sitting between her and L.D., gives her a reassuring pat on the arm. Sans glances at you, raising a browbone -he’s been convinced for some time that those two are more than just friends. You roll your eyes at him, and then twist around in your chair to beam and wave at the newly arrived Papyrus, who hurries up to you to take his seat. Gaster and President Asgore stand in the back, both looking rather uncomfortable in the other’s presence. Toriel makes her way to Asgore, though, and the latter brightens up, his smile only growing broader when Asriel charges over, butting his dad’s head in his excitement (now it’s Frisk’s turn to observe this and be Too Cool - they sign something very quickly to Asha and Monster Kid, who both burst out laughing).

Finally, Undyne, Alphys, and baby Haruhi (who is growing much slower than Dot, and is still a sleepy, scaly infant) join you, followed by Capra, and a moment later Mettaton emerges to thunderous applause. Dot tries clumsily to clap along, giggling, and you watch the light in your husband’s eyes as he beams at her, drinking in the feeling of satisfaction that this thing you’ve all worked so hard on is done, that your community is healing, that your family is safe…

Mettaton’s speech is bittersweet, at times moving, at times somber. When he begins to read off the names of the people who had lost their lives nearly three years ago, many people begin to cry. It had been a tremendous weight on the community, and nearly everyone knew _someone_ who had suffered from the events on that awful day. Sans has to look down when Shyren’s name is mentioned, and Undyne’s lip begins to quiver. By the time Mettaton reaches the end of the list, and Mrs. Parekh, shakily, stands to cut the ribbon, you’ve needed to wipe your eyes too. 

She’s spent the last few weeks absolutely refusing to speak, saying that she feels uncomfortable, that she won’t know what to say, but today, she hesitates in front of the microphone, and then abruptly adjusts it - Mettaton is much taller than her. 

“My son,” she begins, “died because the cruelty of men can... echo. It can echo through people, through groups, through centuries. It can infect and it can… corrupt.” She says, struggling for the word for a moment. “But just as cruelty has the power to spread, so does acceptance. Caring. Unity.” She takes a deep breath. “Love. My son loved his sister, and his community, and his friends. He knew how it felt to be judged by his appearance, and when the monsters arrived, he never even considered not welcoming them with open arms. He knew it was the right thing to do. He was... stolen from us, but his beliefs… his love, his acceptance, it lives on. It echoes through us. It brought all of us here today.” She hesitates, then says, “How will your actions echo? How will time remember you? I ask that you commit this day to the same vision as my son. To welcome differences with open arms. To laugh, and to love, and to… protect.” Her voice cracks slightly on the last word. “Will you promise me this?” She asks the crowd.

Undyne begins to clap first, but she starts a tidal wave of agreement, and before you know it, the whole assembled crowd is on their feet, clapping and cheering, growing to a crescendo when Mrs. Parekh cuts the ribbon. 

The event extends late into the night, half party, half memorial. The summer breeze, the sea, the food, the friends, the memories… it all hurts, but it’s a good hurt. It feels right. It feels like healing. 

Even later, once Dot is tucked in bed, once everyone has returned to their respective corners of the mansion, when it’s just you, a dozy skeleton and a baby monitor, Sans looks at you through half lidded eyes.

“i love you so much.” He mumbles into the pillow. 

“I love you too.” You sigh, and reach for his hand above the covers, snuggling just a little closer.

You’ve weathered nightmares with this man. You’ll probably weather more. But you’ll do it. You’ll be okay. You’re not alone anymore. 

Your family will always be with you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I honestly can't believe that this is it, but... this is it. Every story has a beginning and an end, and, oh buddy, we did it. We hit the end. The end end.
> 
> I have shared this story in part, but I'll share it again. When I started writing Chill or Be Chilled, I was right smack dab in the darkest period of my entire life. I had recently recovered from a severe and sudden illness, I was unemployed, I had no prospects of _being_ employed until I passed an exam that I'd already failed once (see: sudden illness). More than that, I was crushingly, desperately depressed. Like, boy howdy. I did not feel great. My life seemed like it had gone entirely off the rails for reasons that I was not responsible for, and I didn't cope well. I spent October and November in a stupor of just kind of staring straight ahead and glassily refreshing the news every once in a while. That and browsing Tumblr. 
> 
> One day, I saw an Undertale fanfic link on tumblr. I honestly can't remember what it even was. All I remember was clicking it, and going "huh." 
> 
> And then, the next day, "well. That was weird."
> 
> And then the next day, "Like... people are really into that skeleton." 
> 
> Until finally, "Well. Fuck. _I_ can do that."
> 
> And so now, more than a year later, more than 450,000 words later, here we are. End of the line. Kinda.
> 
> I am in no way dissembling when I say that this story, but more importantly, you guys, you people who might have been reading this since day one, who might have picked this up yesterday, who might be reading this two years from now, you kept me going - not just in this story, but in general. In a time where I was ready to convince myself that I was never going to succeed at any endeavor, you guys thoroughly, relentlessly kept me going. Every single comment, kudos, hit - it kept me persisting, both in this story and in my own life. Furthermore, some of the people who started reading this story reached out to me and just somehow became a part of my life. Some of them are now, against all goddamn odds, my very closest friends.
> 
> I can't end this without thanking Wrexie, who does the art, who makes me think, who has been my creative partner, who I probably talk to more than anyone else on the planet, and who you can catch drawing CoBC stuff, playing videogames, doing japes and goofin' off with your old pal TST thrice weekly on stream. I also can't not thank OnaDacora, who has always been there to dig me out of my writing struggles and help me figure out what I'm actually doing, even if it's just to say like "Ona, I can't figure out how to - never mind, I got it." Actually, I've got a bunch of those - I probably shouldn't just list off names, but trust me, you guys know who you are, and I am so entirely grateful to each and every one of you. 
> 
> And, of course, there's everyone else. Each and every one of you wonderful people who read all the words my brain spat out and liked them. I've got good news for you, by the way. I'm done with this story, but I'm not done writing. I'm already in the process of writing some original fiction, as I've mentioned before. It's called "We're Going To Kill The Duke," and it'll have all the things you love about CoBC (action! drama! time travel! romance! I guess maybe skeletons though probably not as main characters because I'm doing something different here!). I mean, look, downside, it won't be freeee because one way or the other I want to actually make money off of writing - you know how that be - but! There will be a book! You can find out more about it, sign up for a newsletter and get updates, at the soon to be growing [ T.S. Debris website. ](http://tsdebris.com) (That's my pseudonym because I think I'm clever.) Of course, if you've loved what you've read and you can't even WAIT for The Duke to come out to support me, there are ways to do that fiscally on my blog, or so I've heard. Up to you sweet babies. 
> 
> That said, I'm gonna keep you guys interested. Every once in a while, I'll post a CoBC epilogue chapter up here. It'll be fun. You'll like it. Buy my book when it comes out. This isn't a bribe. Just a reminder. Buy my book. 
> 
> Okay. Big kisses. Love you lots.
> 
> -TST
> 
> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [Come hang out at stream](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)


	171. Bonus 1: Birthday Boy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promised I'd do some of these! So here is one!  
> Don't u forget about me!
> 
> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)   
>  [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)   
>  [Come hang out at stream](https://picarto.tv/wrexington)

Forty-four.  
Forty-goddamn motherfucking _four_.

The thing was, it was that forty-four was _so_ close to forty-five, and then from forty-five, it was fifty, and then he’d be _ancient_ and next thing you knew it was all walkers and white pubes and your robot boyfriend was now your robot caretaker as you doddered blissfully off into the soft glow of dementia. 

If you made it that far. 

Dot, seated on his lap, ignoring Adventure Time and currently… well, giving him a little of that uncanny valley shit with those too big eyes - Dot was going through a Disney phase, and hadn’t been even a little bony for almost two months now, which Sans was hurt by and was pretending very much that he wasn’t because, well, you would probably bite his head off - okay, that wasn’t fair, he shouldn’t make fun of your thing - what was he even thinking about again?

He was losing the thread.

Forty-four. 

“I _said,_ Peter, do you want to play podracers?” Dot says again, squirming, and he sighs.

“Sorry kiddo. Go find Uncle Paps, he’s got more energy than me.”

“But it’s your birthday!” Sassy little five year old. Five-and-almost-a-half, going on seventeen - Dot was already certain that she knew everything.

“Yes. You understand me perfectly. I am decrepit, youngling.” He grumbles, though not without a smile. Her heart’s in the right place, even if she wants to play _prequels_. “Go find Paps, he’s already a skeleton. Or, like, play with your mom and dad, I’m pretty sure your mom’s in the kitch….eh, maybe don’t do that.” He catches himself. “She might be having one of her… you know, snacks.” 

Dot wrinkles her nose. 

“Yeah, I know. But your little brother is giving her some pretty weird cravings and we all promised we wouldn’t be grossed out by it-”

“You’re supposed to cook meat.” She says firmly. 

“Hey, no argument here.” 

“You can get samella.” She informs him gravely, staring up at him with sparkling, too big eyes. He grins, then says, slowly,

“Salmonella.” She purses her lips in a scowl, and he raises an eyebrow at the little girl, waiting. Almost a full minute ticks by, and then she relents. 

“Salmonella.” She repeats. 

“Way to go, ace. And salmonella is a what?”

“‘Acteria.”

“Nice.” He holds out his fist, and she hesitates, then giggles and fistbumps him enthusiastically before climbing off his lap. “Hey, where you going?” He realizes abruptly that he doesn’t want Dot to leave; she’s keeping his foul mood at bay. Maybe he could find the energy to play podracers. It wouldn’t be that much skin off his neck, right? His probably wrinkly neck?

She rolls her eyes, then says. “You’re bad at having ears. Haruhi and Aunt Undyne and Aunt Alphys and Uncle Me-”

“Oh shit, already?!” 

She puts her hands on her hips and gives him a very hard look, one that reminds him so much of Sans at his most intractable.

“And Uncle Mettaton are coming up the front steps. _I’m_ going to play with Haruhi. _She’s_ fun.” She says pointedly, before storming off, a vision in pink tulle and tiny combat boots. 

He’d found them online and they were great. 

He swallows, running his hand through his (thankfully, still thick, still glossy, still fucking black) hair. Mettaton had only been gone for a week, but he missed the guy! Oh god, and there would be cake and presents and a day of being forcefully reminded that the clock was turning so much faster for one of them, and… ah, fuck. He didn’t _want_ the reminder that…

He couldn’t stand the thought of leaving Mettaton on his own.

It had been getting in the way of a lot of things, recently. He’d never figured he was the marryin’ type, but six years was awfully long to keep the most important person on earth as just your “boyfriend.” Mettaton hadn’t said anything, and he hadn’t said anything, and they hadn’t _talked_ about this, they’d talked about everything else except this, the timeline where Threep observed his smooth slide from dapper to dentures, and…

He needs a drink. 

He storms into the kitchen, and you, in front of the fridge, jump guiltily - a red dribble on your chin, a guilty hand moving a fork behind you. 

“I’m so sorry.” You mumble after a moment, looking down at your belly. This was probably the world’s biggest baby; you were only seven months in! “He’s just kind of a… you know.”

“Carnivore?” He says wryly, nudging you with his shoulder so he can get at the beer Sans kept pointedly labeling “sans’s”. He groans, seeing the evidence of your binge. “The hamburger meat?” He sighs. 

“I know. I know, it’s disgusting, I’m disgusting-”

“No! Dr. Stanley said you were good, so you do you! It’s just that, like, you know in terms of bacterial contamination, ground beef is basically as bad as it gets, right? Like, all that bad shit gets mixed up and there’s so much more surface area to get exposed to bacteria, and I know you’re basically like Wolverine, healingwise, while that little freeloader’s riding in there, but it still can’t be _good_ -”

“You just caught me. Eating raw hamburger meat. With blood dripping down my face. I’m disgusting.” You sigh, daring him to argue. He hesitates, cracks the beer open, then he can’t help himself.

“Myoglobin.” 

“What.” You grumble, reaching for the paper towels to wipe your face. 

“It’s not blood. It’s a protein called myoglobin. It’s found, like, _in_ blood, but it’s not-”

“Can you not be that guy?”

“Hey! I’m the birthday boy!” He says, a big show of mock indignation to try and make you smile. It does. A little too wide.

“You heard him.” You address over his shoulder. “He’s the birthday boy. He’s pulling that card. That means mandatory fun tonight.”

“Aw, fuck-” He begins, but he doesn’t get much else out because Mettaton’s taken hold of his shoulders, and is pointedly turning him for a kiss. 

Okay, that part’s not too bad.

“Hey.” He laughs, once he’s sure Mettaton is entirely done. “Welcome home, Threep.”

“Happy birthday, Peter.” Mettaton beams, and when Capra rolls his eyes, he adds, almost tauntingly, “Birthday boy.”

“...Yeah, yeah.” He’s already scrambling to turn this around. “Well. I’m the birthday boy. I get to do what I want, right?”

“Of course.” Mettaton purrs, kissing his chin again. Oh, Mettaton’s got energy to spare, too, and he loves this, he fucking loves this, but what’ll happen when he can’t keep up?

“...Good. Let’s go get her some like… filet mignon, at least-”

“Cap…” You begin, but he gives you a look.

“Birthday. Boy.” He says clippedly. “Plus, no family member of mine is going to eat raw hamburger. Undignified.”

“What about steak tartare?” Mettaton can’t help but point out, even though he’s beaming at him. Threep loves when his altruistic side comes out to play. 

“Well, it _starts_ as fucking steak at least!” He groans, then nudges his boyfriend. “C’mon, let’s go, it’s actually pretty nice out today.”

Kinda. Everything in the middle of November was dying. 

Including, like, him.

...Okay, that was too dramatic for his own taste. Still, Mettaton knows something’s on his mind, and it’s only when they’ve gotten to the car, and it’s moving on it’s own, and he’s kissing Threep much more greedily than he had in the kitchen - Mettaton pulls away.

“Something’s wrong.” He says, soft, worried. “Peter, please-”

“‘S nothing.” 

“Peter…”

“Nothing.” He tries again, and then settles back on the driver’s seat, staring out the windshield, letting the car take them through the scenic route to that hipster butcher that Shadow likes so much. 

“Ah.” Mettaton glances out the passenger window, his body moving away, and that’s all it takes.

“I’m _old_.” 

“Peter, love, you’re forty-four!” Mettaton says, startled enough to laugh. “I must be at least … well, I’m several times your age-”

“Exactly.” He sighs, and there’s a finality there.

“Ah.” Mettaton repeats, understanding echoing in just the one syllable.

“Ah.” Capra says quietly back, now looking out his own window.

There’s a painful moment, a moment that stretches on much longer than it should, where he can just _feel_ Threep itching to say something, and he grinds his teeth, because this is it, the problem without a solution, and-

“I’m an idiot.” Mettaton pronounces slowly.

“What?! No, Threep-”

“No.” The robot is stern. “I… I’ve been putting something off. I just… I couldn’t stand to upset you, I figured I’d have time, but… I didn’t realize…” He trails off, looking very guilty. He can’t even meet Capra’s eyes.

“...Come on, guy, just…. just rip the bandage off, okay?” He finally grunts. “If… I know… I mean, why would you want to… I know it’s too much and…. just... “ No no no nonononono. This. This conversation was suddenly happening and he didn’t want it to fucking happen, it was…

_It was his fucking birthday._

Mettaton looks so sorry, and that’s almost enough. If this were one of those movies, the ones that always depend on confusion, on missed understandings, they’d be at the supermarket and he’d storm out and call a cab and break up and then they’d learn their lesson, they’d learn to live for the fucking now-

But it’s not. It’s not one of those, and Mettaton looks like he wants to cry, but he says; “Don’t be an ass. Of course it’s not that. I will stay with you for as long as you’ll have me.”

“Mettaton-”

“Peter, I’m so sorry. It’s just that-”

“Mettaton, please-”

“You’re _not._ ” Mettaton pauses, hesitates, then says, “Er. Growing old, I mean. You’re _not._ ”

“...What.” 

He literally can’t comprehend this, what Mettaton is driving at. Mettaton sees this.

“I have… you know. A photographic memory.” He says pointedly. “I have seen … I can look back, and I can see so much change from when I met you. ________. Sans. Papyrus. Alphys and Undyne. Goodness, Dot and Haruhi. They’ve all… grown. Changed. Gotten older. But you…”

“No, look, I know, I know, I look prettttty fucking good for forty-something, but Threep, I-”

“ _You haven’t changed at all._ ” Mettaton says forcefully. “Since that day on the mountain, Peter. Since you pulled in all that power, since you saved the world-”

“Okay, but that’s not even possible. Entropy. Things decay-”

“Peter.” Mettaton says, pained now. “Perhaps… oh gods. Perhaps… it runs in the family?”

Oh.

OH.

“Ah.” He says, his eyes suddenly very wide, glassy.

“Ah.” Mettaton repeats, and there’s a moment where nothing happens, and then Cap yanks down the visor, pulling open the mirror, and-

How had he not noticed this?

How had he not noticed before that…

It was just, you knew what you looked like! You didn’t ever expect to look in the mirror, see a change, that shit was gradual, it happened over time, but it…

It hadn’t.

“What does this mean?” He asks slowly, processing like the normally whirling gears in his head have just had a shit ton of industrial grade, like… he doesn’t know, like cheese or something dumped on them, everything’s gummed up and he can’t-

“It doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t have to mean anything. You’re not like him. You’re nothing like him. It’s okay. It will be okay.” Mettaton says in a rush, urging him to believe. “I will… I promise. I promise, it doesn’t mean-”

“Marry me.” 

“What?”

“Fucking- If I’m not- If I won’t - fucking… SHIT. You know that wasn’t an order, right? I mean, I can turn the damn thing off now, I just want this to be perfectly-”

“Yes.”

He stops the car, and even though it’s there, just there on the side of the road, there with nothing but dying plants and dead leaves and not even a fucking beach view, he stays and it’s beautiful.

It’s the most beautiful place he’s ever been.

“I love you.” He mutters, a few minutes later. “I just never want to leave you.”

“Shh. I know.” Mettaton murmurs. “I know.”

There’s a beat. A silence. A fear.

“What if it doesn’t last-”

“We’ll figure it out.”

“I want to stay with you for the whole thing.”

“Then you will.” 

Another beat. Another fear.

“Mettaton?”

“I promise.” 

“No, just… will you… you’ll keep me human, right? If I… you know-”

“You won’t.”

“No, but if I do. If I start Dennising-”

“I will keep you human.” The monster promises.

He’s forty-four.

It’s his birthday.

He has it all.


	172. Bonus 2: The Kool-Aid Stains On The Mouth Of A Kid (Whose Name Is Most Likely Cody)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I uh... figured I'd get a crack on this tonight and then an hour and a half later it was all written wtf. 
> 
>  
> 
> [blog](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com)  
> [fan art](https://totalskeletontrash.tumblr.com/tagged/chill-or-be-chilled-fanart)  
> 

“i’m scared for him.” He admits, then grits his teeth, averting his eyes so he doesn’t have to meet yours. “i feel like... “ You rub your temples, looking troubled, worse than troubled maybe. 

You’re scared too.

“Kids can be cruel.” You murmur, after a moment, and there’s so much you’re not saying there, it fucking kills him. 

“it’s my fault.” He mutters, and now you glare properly at him. 

“The fuck it is, Sans. Just because he’s … bony-”

“it’s not that.” He hisses, his voice hushed. “just… oh god. when we decided to have another… babe, i prayed.”

“You don’t believe in-”

“yeah, i know i don’t. even so. i prayed.” He gets out of bed, pacing, needing something to do with the nervous energy. “we got so lucky with dot. she could be so _safe_. blend into any crowd, fucking… pass… i know.” He takes a deep breath. “i know. i just… i wanted that for him too. i wanted nobody to ever, ever fuck with him. i wanted him to be safe. maybe i made this-”

“Sans.” You climb out of bed too, and for a moment he’s lost in that same old feeling, that stuttering of his soul somewhere under his ribs, because even ten years later - no, especially ten years later - you are so unbelievably beautiful to him. He sees the light of your soul, that calm flicker, and he wants to reach out and be soothed, but… “You didn’t make it happen. Cody’s just… special.”

“people are gonna want to hurt him.” He whispers. “babe, when we saw him, _we-_ ” 

“Please. Don’t.” You look away, shamefaced, suddenly unable to meet his gaze as he reminds you of what he fears you consider to be your greatest failing. 

Dot had come into the world so easily, a beacon of light and joy that everyone, god, everyone had fallen in love with. Even Cap, who was frightened of kids, who had spent that last anxious month giving your belly increasingly apprehensive looks… all it had taken was one little, tiny, perfect hand reaching out to squeeze his finger and Cap had been helpless. 

Cody, on the other hand…

He’d been panicking from about four months, as it became increasingly obvious that the baby that was growing inside you was nothing that was ever designed to be in you. The ultrasounds were never clear, but he knew for sure that Cody was _big_ and… like him. Bony like him. 

He’d fretted, watching you grow, watching your tastes change as you adapted to your son. So many bloody things - the baby seemed to _demand_ blood. It hadn’t really surprised him, somehow, when he’d seen him for the first time.

Cody had been too big to deliver. A c-section became necessary almost a full month early, when there was a point that even you couldn’t handle, when he woke up one morning to find you curled in on yourself, shaking and sweating, your arms wrapped around your belly as you tried not to cry. Four hours later, and Dr. Stanley was pulling him out of you, and he’d _seen him_ , he’d seen his son for the first time.

His bones were so white, but he was glistening with gore, with his mother’s blood, and when he stretched out his little limbs, lifted his head - what baby could do that, it had taken months for Dot to have that kind of control - and then he’d growled, he’d actually growled -

Those jagged bones, those deadly spikes. Those sharp little horns. The angular face, the eyesockets where something red flickered. That deep, deep crimson soul. So dark it was almost black. Cody had been like a little prince of hell.

You were cut open, and this _thing_ had been responsible for that, and Sans _hated_ him. 

He’d looked up at your face, and you were looking up at that growling baby covered in blood and in your eyes all he could see was panic and horror, maybe even disgust.

You had never forgiven yourself for that reaction, just as he’d never been able to let go of the self loathing for how he’d looked at his son, his little boy, his… his Cody. Because a second later, Cody had reached for you, reached for you, letting out a little whimper of utter urgency, and when Dr. Stanley brought him closer, Cody had clung to you, skin to bone, and almost instantly, the expression on your face had changed.

“He’s so… soft.” You’d murmured deliriously. “Like you. He’s soft. He makes a body, he…” 

Dr. Stanley had still been studying you with alarm. “He… goodness. He could have hurt you so…. those spikes… the horns…”

“He was trying so hard not to.” You’d whispered, your eyes closing. They were closing you up then, but you were barely noticing, lost in the little soul on your breast. “Sans. He was trying _so hard not to hurt me_.” 

He’d reached out, laid a tentative hand on the tiny back and - oh. His son. 

His perfect, perfect son.

\------------------------------------------------

You’d both been worried about the others, because _how could they understand_ , how could they possibly know how perfect this baby was? The first meeting in the hospital had been… tough. Well, not with Dot. Dot was five and too young to care or to judge or to do anything but squeal at delight at her new little brother, to make a face when he tried to pull her finger to his mouth, those sharp, sharp teeth so delicate and careful even at this age. Dot had been fine. Papyrus, who had brought her, seemed utterly oblivious to anything being a little… different about this baby. He’d just beamed, a hand clamped over his mouth - his usual process to remember that you weren’t supposed to yell around sleeping infants. 

Undyne and Alphys and Mettaton and Cap had come next, though, and that… he cringes now, to remember the abject horror on Undyne and Alphys’ faces, unconcealed, and even on Mettaton, only slightly more self-aware. Then:

“Holy shit.” Capra had murmured, his eyes alight. “Oh, holy goddamn shit.”

“cap-”

“He’s. Amazing.” Capra had breathed, hurrying forward. “Oh my god, look at him. Look at him! He’s so! Threep, are you fucking seeing-”

“Yes, dear-”

“He’s-”

“Peter-”

“HE’S SO COOL.” Capra had insisted, and at that, Cody had stirred, looked up at his… his family, and then let out a little chuckle.

Two days old, and he’d woken up from a nap with a laugh. 

He’d been the perfect baby, the perfect toddler, the perfect little brother. He was so careful, so intelligent, so sensitive. The night Ghost had passed, he’d heard you sobbing in your room and - three! he was three! - he’d hurried to comfort you, he’d promised you that it would be okay, that the hurt would go away someday.

Cody always seemed to know a little too much. 

People hated him, of course. There was something visceral about his appearance, no matter what they tried. The horns, that dark glimmer in his eyes, no matter how they dressed him up, humans - even monsters sometimes - would jerk back, disgusted and fearful. And he got big so fast! He got strong so fast! He was five now, but in the body of a ten year old at least, a ten year old demon that struck fear into the hearts of man, and he didn’t know it yet. He didn’t understand why people weren’t his friends. He was only five!

He was so big, and so little.

\--------------------------------------------------

“Dot’ll be there on the school bus with him.” You remind him, and he grimaces.

“dot’s… she’s ten! she wants to be popular, she wants people to like her, she’s been all human for about three years now if you hadn’t noticed-”

“I know. I know.” You suck in a breath through your teeth. “And Haruhi will be there, but she’s so shy… Just… We can’t hold him back another year, though. He’s too smart! He’s got your brain, he’s going crazy even with all of us chipping in, it’s not the same as learning with other kids. And Tori will keep an eye on him. It’ll be okay.”

“we’ve just never done this.” He sighs. It’s true. Cody’s never been on his own like this, not for a whole day, much less a whole school year. How could he keep his son safe when he just _knew_...

“We’ve got to give him a shot.” You sigh. “Maybe the other kids will surprise us.”

“...maybe.” 

You both climb back into bed, make the usual motions of going to sleep, but you don’t. You both lie there, awake, and you worry.

\------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cody picks up on your worry, even if he doesn’t understand exactly why. He gives both of you extra hugs the next morning, and Sans almost wants to cry, looking at his son - dressed in his first day of school best, with that angular face, those long and deadly horns, those vicious teeth, and sneakers that light up when you walk in them, and a cheeseburger backpack, and a spark of barely contained anticipation because he just can’t wait to finally be like Dot, to go to school, to learn!

Dot is mourning the end of her summer over soggy bran cereal, which she’s picked because it matches her somber mood. She’s chosen long, straight blonde hair and bright lavender eyes and she has definitely cheated a little on your “don’t make yourself look like you’re wearing makeup yet” rule. She smiles at Cody when he asks her, for the fifth or six time, what o’clock it was. 

“Don’t worry, Codes, the bus isn’t going to leave without us.” She snickers. “Give it a week and you’ll be wishing it didn’t show up at all.” 

Sans’ smile twitches. He hopes she’s not right. 

“Hey! Bus!” Capra calls out from somewhere else in the house, and you gasp, picking up your phone, ready for that first day of school picture, but then you hesitate, worry on your face, and he reads it correctly. Do you really want to be memorializing this?

“hey, we gotta grab some pictures! big day!” He says quickly, and Dot rolls her eyes while Cody bounces excitedly on his heels, his shoes flashing red and blue like the lights of a police car in your rear view mirror. 

The bus driver stops - he’s clearly been doing this all day because he’s already got a weary smile on his face as he waits for the barrage of photography. Then he takes in Cody and does a poorly concealed double take.

Sans grits his teeth so hard he fears they might shatter. 

Dot, Haruhi and Cody are oblivious, so after the two of you exchange a worried glance, you slap a smile on and you, Alphys and Undyne go through the whole routine, snapping photos, looking excited for the kids’ behalf. At some point during this process, you slip your hand into his, and it nearly rattles, you’re trembling so hard. 

It can’t be put off any longer. Cody’s too eager, and the bus needs to go, and… he gives you one last hug, and Sans can just barely hear him whisper something, a sentence that comes out as one rushed word:

“It’sgonnabeokay-” 

Then Cody can’t wait any longer. Beaming, he dashes onto the bus, bolting up the steps, and Dot follows close on his heels, Haruhi trailing and -

There are the sounds of several screams of utter terror. 

“Go away! GO AWAY!” A human boy is shrieking, Sans can’t see through the little bus windows which one, but it’s like his worst nightmare, like every nightmare, and you’re already walking forward when;

“Hey.” Dot’s voice rings out - she’s barely inside the bus, he can see her framed in the door. “Hey!”

Nobody’s paying attention to her. 

“Hey, you fucking _assholes!_ “ She roars. 

(He has a second to feel like he’s a terrible father, that his ten year old was exposed to too much cursing, but then that thought goes away because all he can process is how much he loves his daughter.)

There’s a snap, a disturbance in the door of the bus, and then:

If those kids thought Cody was scary, they hadn’t accounted for Dot’s creativity.

She is tall and lithe and bony and jagged and vicious looking, that beautiful blonde hair from this morning replaced by two jutting horns, her eyes pits with a look that says ‘try me.’ She is coiled like a beast that is about to strike. She is beautiful in her savagery.

“That’s my brother.” She hisses. “He’s _five_. You fuck with him, you fuck with me, understood?”

There is utter silence.

“UNDERSTOOD?” She bellows out, and this time there are a torrent of “yes”ses, even from the bus driver.

“Oh hell yeah.” Sans doesn’t bother to look around at Capra or wonder when the man had joined them - he can already predict the smirk on the guy’s face, and he kind of loves him for it. 

Dot looks at Cody - Sans can barely make him out, still frozen in the front of the bus aisle. 

“I like this body.” She tries out thoughtfully. “I think I’m going to keep it for a while. C’mon Codes. You can sit with me and Haruhi and our friends.” Haruhi nods quickly, cracking her knuckles and showing off her sharp claws. Oh, woe betide the friend who has a problem with that, Sans thinks.

“...’Kay!” Cody chirps, and they move back, back, and then the bus driver gives you and him a nervous glance, and the doors close, and the bus begins to move…

“We did so good.” You murmur to him, your eyes very bright.

“i know.” He sounds a little choked up himself.

“Yeah, I know. We did great.” Capra says with a laugh, and Sans turns around, annoyed, to see that idiot standing there, mouth half full of pop tart with… eyes that were a little too bright too.

“They’ll be okay.” Alphys observes quietly.

“You see that? Our little girl! Doing the knuckle cracking thing I showed her! Hell, I am the proudest parent right now!” Undyne bellows, but Sans looks at you, and he knows that there’s no way that can be entirely true. 

The two of you would have to duke it out for first place.


	173. Jumping the Shark Part 1

“i feel really weird about this.” 

“Sans. The kids are at Tori’s. It’s… totally cool.” You say, just a little unconvincingly, scuffing your toe through the sand. You’re sitting on the retaining wall, it’s dusk, and...

You’d borrowed Burgerpants’ bong. (In this context, you simply couldn't think of him as Lawyerpants, even if the thing had been dusty with disuse and he'd handed it over with a wry chuckle about 'college days.' Lawyerpants was slick and sharp and put together and he just... it was too much to process.)

“it feels like crimes.” Sans mutters.

“Babe. It’s been legal here for like… what, six years?”

“i know. i didn’t say it was crimes. i said it _feels_ like crimes.” He says. “what if-”

“This was your idea, Galileo. Hah. Gali-lame-o.” You tease. He looks up at you, browbones raising minutely. 

“really?”

“Bone Nye The Science Guy?” You offer.

“heh.”

“Neil De-GRASS Tyson?!” You’re getting into it now. “Babe. Get it? Because grass is slang for-”

“i can’t believe _this_ is the thing that gets you into puns.” 

“Well, I’ve found my calling.” You say primly, then remember your point. “You were all ‘heh. heh. i wonder if a skeleton can even get high-’” 

“i don’t sound like that.”

“-And I was like, ‘Well, we’ve got a eight year old who’s going through some super bad growing pains, so unless you find a good babysitter-’”

“i remember how the conversation went!” He laughs, holding his hands up. 

“Well, so now here we are. We’re totally going to do this.” You both eye the bong dubiously again. 

“i don’t even get how it works.” Sans admits. “don’t you-”

“Oh, right, like I could afford drugs back when all the other kids were doing this. I have no idea, dude.” You snicker, hopping off the retaining wall just to sink to a seat in the sand in front of it, leaning your back against the cool stones. 

“so maybe we don’t do it.” He sounds relieved. You raise an eyebrow. 

“You’re such a dad now.” You point out. 

“i know!” He sounds distressed. “i used to be cool, right? the coolest. sans the cool skeleton, they called me.”

“Mhm.” You say placatingly. You’ve heard this speech before. 

“but now it’s just like… i know the second i do this, a kid’s just gonna come wandering over and be like-”

“‘Mom and Dad, you’re old and lame and embarrassing?’” You can do a hell of a Dot impression, even if your Sans is somewhat lacking.

“or worse. ‘daddy, my back still hurts.’” Sans says, the humor in his voice dropping. He doesn’t bother to imitate Cody - he can’t get his voice to get that low. You grimace.

“Yeah. I know.” You say quietly. “Poor Codes.” 

“he’s being a trooper, ‘s just… poor cody.” He agrees, rubbing the back of his neck, making a soft clattering sound. “but still - kid.”

“Yeah, I know-”

“no.” He’s looking past you, onto the beach. “there’s a kid.” He nods his head meaningfully, and you turn. Huh. He’s right. Even though it’s almost nighttime, even though barely anyone but your family uses the beach after the community center closes… there’s a kid walking tentatively towards you.

“Well, at least it’s not one of ours.” You mutter, awkwardly nudging the bong behind some dune grass as quickly as you can. Sans is already walking towards the kid in question, his face the rigid smiling mask he uses when he meets strangers.

“uh… hey kid. you ok?” He asks, and you jog to his side a moment later, ready to help. 

She’s not _really_ a kid. She looks a little older than Dot. Fourteen? Fifteen? But she’s small, and pale, and she’s got a backpack on her back that somehow seems bigger than the rest of her. She’s just kind of… standing there. Staring at the two of you. Her gaze travels over her shoulder - pale blue eyes, jet black hair with a purple streak, and a soul that’s-

“...Is that a _bong?_ ” She demands, eyebrows darting upwards.

“what? no!” Sans says hurriedly. Her eyes light up. 

“Yes it is! That’s a bong! You guys are actual, like… degenerate hippie communists, aren’t you?!” She takes a deep breath, then pumps her fist in victory. “YES!”

“...what.” Sans is lost. You’re only slightly less lost. You nudge his ribs with your elbow, then nod at her meaningfully. His brow furrows, then he squints and he sees it. 

That shiny, metallic purple soul. 

“...you’re lookin’ for peter capra, aren’t you.” He says slowly. She beams, a dazzling, trillion watt smile.

“I.” She says, really relishing every syllable. “Am most definitely looking for Peter Capra.” 

\-----------------------------------------------

“Okay? So like, uh, who is she?” He demands. The girl looked happy enough when she walked in with Cheech and fucking Chong, but then she’d laid eyes on him, waited for a second, and then her smile had dropped. Now she was just standing there awkwardly in the kitchen, bright blue eyes fixed on a spot on the ground. 

“uh… i was figuring you would know.” Sans mutters, and Capra feels an inexplicable stab of guilt for not knowing who this random tween in his kitchen was.

“I do not.” He says pointedly, then looks back at the kid. “Kid? Random little girl who’s looking for me? Some help would be nice?” 

The kid looks up at him, and something begins to scratch at the back of his head, because come to think of it, she _does_ look at least a little familiar…

“Ummm…” Her confidence and swagger seems to have melted into a small puddle around her feet. “I’m… you know. Molly?” She says in a small voice.

Now that definitely sounds familiar. 

“Molly.” He repeats.

“Molly… Capra?” She squeaks.

Oh.

Ohhhhhhhh.

“Ohhhhhhhhhhhh.” He says slowly, ignoring the sudden flurry of elbows between you and Sans as you both desperately try to communicate something to each other. 

“Um. Yeah. Sorry. I know we never really talk or anything. Like. Ever. I just kinda… didn’t know where else to go?” She whispers, almost making eye contact again. 

A heavy pause falls over the kitchen for one second, two seconds, three, then-

“KID OR RELATIVE?!” You demand, unable to contain your curiosity. He whirls to glare at you and your stupid-ass snickering-ass bony-ass… ass of a husband, at the same time that Molly interjects;

“Sister!”

“Kind of!” He adds, just as quickly, and when she looks at him again, this time hurt beyond measure, fuck, that look is a real roundhouse right to the balls, and he finds himself scrambling to explain. “Sorry, kid, it’s just like, you know? Different… moms? Not like we grew up… in the same house or... decade? No real … connection to speak of? Kind of forgot you existed, since you don’t play a significant or even real part in my life-”

He is not making this better. She’s cringing away with every word.

“Oh god.” Molly suddenly looks tiny. “Oh my god. I am the dumbest.” Her eyes look suspiciously bright now, and he grimaces, holding up a hand, but it’s too late, she’s triggered... fucking... _parental_ mode in you and Sans because suddenly Sans is glaring at him and you are right by her side, helping her backpack off, your mouth a firm, determined line.

“Hey, don’t cry.” You’re saying softly, putting a gentle hand on her back. She twitches, pulling away from you in that instinctive, kneejerk way he remembers all too well from when he’d been fourteen and small and pale and worried and…

Something clicks at last.

“He’s still a bastard, huh?” He asks the kid - Molly - quietly, walking forward. She bites her lip, then nods quickly. “Oh, god. Jesus. You ran, didn’t you?” 

She can’t meet his eyes.

“What did he do?” He suddenly needs to know, a fully unexpected rush of protectiveness for this kid bubbling up from somewhere he didn’t normally store feelings, like, his left lung or something. Maybe a pancreas. How many - was it like, only the one pancreas humans had, or was that one of the ones like kidneys and lungs where you had a spare, because if he had a spare, maybe that’s where he’d been keeping all these extra feelings like ‘protectiveness for your kid sister’ or ‘desire to go to a garage sale with Mettaton’ or -

Focus.

“...It wasn’t just one thing.” She’s saying. “It was everything. Every day. You lived with him… you remember, right?” She sounds like she’s begging, almost, for him to understand.

He grits his teeth, thinking of his dad, thinking of the way he always moved, spoke, acted with such… precision. 

You never knew when that fucker was going to lash out at you. You lived in quiet fear because it was safer that way, to always be on edge. If you were always braced, you were never caught by surprise. 

He was caught by surprise pretty often anyway, even when he _was_ always braced. That man could tear you down without a physical blow, just find a weak spot in your psyche and chip and chip and the next thing you knew, he was in there, always, just calmly and rationally explaining how nobody would love you, not now, not ever, because you were a spoiled, stupid piece of shit who couldn’t-

“He hates you so much.” Molly blurts out, eyes wide. “That’s why I came here, because he just… Every newspaper you’re in, he burns. Doesn’t just throw out. _Burns._ In the fireplace.” He almost smiles at that, but she’s still going, faster; “He broke two TVs throwing the remote at them when you were on and the channel didn’t change fast enough. Broke my phone when he saw I listened to a Mettaton song once. I just… I just thought…” 

“Molly.” He doesn’t know what he’s really trying to say, so he just says her name and it lies there, like he’d just tossed a salmon on the floor between them, like that would be helpful instead of awkward and… floppy. 

“I… I just figured anyone he hated that much… maybe you would… I don’t know. It’s so stupid. I’m so stupid. I didn’t think this out. He’s going to… oh god. He’s going to kill me when you send me back.” She mutters, and falls quiet, twisting her foot and moving her gaze to the ground again. He spares a glance at you and Sans.

Sans looks quite horrified, but you;

“Sans, can you go make up the bed next to Dot’s room for Molly?” You’re looking urgently into Capra’s eyes now, even though you’re ostensibly talking to your husband “She’ll need somewhere to sleep.”

“on it.” Sans steps into thin air and vanishes, and Capra catches, just for a split second, a look of sheer wonder in Molly’s eyes before she remembers how awkward she feels and looks away again. You’re still busy, though. “Molly, did you eat?” You don’t even hesitate to hear her answer. “I’m making you food. What do you want, we’ve got cold pizza in the fridge, mac and cheese, I can order Thai, Chinese, Indian, Indonesian, whatever you want, literally. Name it.”

For a second, he thinks this list you’re rattling off is kind of silly - some mother hen bullshit, right? Moms, right?! - but then he looks at you, behind that determined, fixed expression on your face, and he sees something he doesn’t quite understand. Fear? Grief? Pain? 

You anxiously raise a finger to your mouth, chewing a nail in a nervous way he hasn’t seen in years and years, and when Molly doesn’t answer, still shrinking away from… god, everything, you add, almost desperately, “I think there’s a Korean place? You must be hungry…” 

He realizes what you’re seeing suddenly. 

A little girl, desperate enough to run.

A little girl who’s too small for her age, too old and too young all at once, with watery eyes, and what if she’s _hungry_ -

It’s you. 

It’s you all over again, and he’s playing his fucking role to a T, isn’t he, because when little girls with shitty parental/guardian figures need some fucking help, Peter Capra is always there to swoop in and say his favorite heroic catchphrase:

_Fuck off and find someone else!_

He clenches his teeth, sweeping his hand through his hair. Not this time. Not this shit again, Peter. 

Do it better this time.

“The Chinese place is really good.” He says quietly. “Kickass wonton soup.” 

She hesitates, then mumbles, “...I love wonton soup.”

Your eyes light up, and your phone’s already out of your pocket before she finishes talking. He glances at you, then closes the ten or so feet between where he’s standing and Molly, before grabbing her backpack. “C’mon, let’s get you set up in your room. I’ll figure out what to do about your… uh, I guess _our_ father tomorrow, huh?”

His stomach twists a little, thinking about that, and she flinches, but he adds quickly, “Don’t worry. Not sending you packing. You’re family. Family’s got a place here. I mean, it’s not perfect. Undyne keeps forgetting whose toothbrush is whose but… you don’t know who Undyne is-”

“Yes I do!” She says quickly. “I’ve got the internet, dude? … I mean-”

“I’m just saying, kid. Guard that toothbrush.” He says. She follows him into the hall, then stops.

“Look, you don’t have to - I don’t know what I was doing, I just hopped a bus-”

“From where?”

“Well, Georgia, but you know, I could only buy the really cheap tickets so it’s been a few… it’s been a while on the road.”

“How long?” He demands. She averts her eyes.

“Seventeen days. I think. Maybe eighteen.”

“Jesus, kid!” 

“Yeah… well. Maybe they’ll have noticed I’m gone by tomorrow.” She doesn’t sound optimistic about the prospect. He takes a second to process this, already knowing what he’s going to do. He shouldn’t make big decisions like this without talking to his husband, or to you and Sans for that matter, but…

“Well. Good news for you, bud. I’ve got a really good lawyer.” He says, slinging her backpack up onto his shoulder. “C’mon. Let’s set up home base, huh? Then you’d better eat before Skarm starts freaking out-”

“Did she really get that when she was fighting a thousand humans with guns?” Molly suddenly demands. “Does that stuff happen a lot? Should I like… can I get cool blasters or something in case - I just heard Ebott gets pretty - oh my god I just processed this I’m actually in Ebott - Did you um, you know Ebott only has one B, right? Like? EbbCo is a bad name?”

Welp.

She’s his sister.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be a part 2 to this.


	174. Holy Shit, Look At That Shark Down There

He’s honestly a little insulted by just how well Mettaton takes all this. At first, he’d been impressed - wow, holy shit could Mettaton roll with the punches?! A kid unexpectedly shows up on their proverbial doorstep, and Mettaton’s already thinking about school districts, about legal issues, about a thousand things that hadn’t even occurred to him - how were her teeth? Did she need a doctor? Did she play an instrument? Draw? Did she have allergies? What _grade_ was she even in-

“Jesus, you’d think you planned on my kid sister showing up.” He sighs, collapsing to a seat on the edge of their bed and running his hand anxiously through his hair. “That’s a lot. You’re smart. You know that? You’re the smartest fucker I think I’ve ever met.”

“Thank you. I think.” Mettaton says, arching a perfect brow, then glances away. “I, er… It had crossed my mind that we might need a plan ready.”

“If my kid sister showed up?” He squints up at his husband, who grits his teeth, producing the irritating, endearing sound of metal grinding against metal.

“Well. No.” He says, and Capra cottons on.

“I mean, I mighta been an idiot, but I still _used protection!_ Christ, why does everyone in this damn house think that I might have secret kids from like fifteen years ago?!”

“Well… er. Statistically-”

“Threep.” He chides, tilting his head.

“Well. We do all _remember_ you from fifteen years ago. But… Look. I never banked on it!” His husband laughs, holding up his hands guiltily. “It was just a contingency plan. I do make those, you know, darling.” 

“Yeah.” He yawns, rubbing his eye, still squinting suspiciously at Mettaton. “I know.” He hesitates, now running his fingers in an anxious rhythm over the spot where the scar (that still mars his perfect, perfect face) slices into his (perfect, perfect) hair - at least until Mettaton sits down next to him and eases his hand away, recognizing the habit as a repetitive habit that boded poorly for his level of stress.

“It’ll be okay.” He reassures him, and Capra hesitates once more, then nods.

“She seems like a good kid.” He says - the kind of thing people said about kids when they didn’t know anything about kids. He’s staring at the door out of their bedroom, the door leading to the rest of the house where somewhere a fourteen year old child he was intending to take full responsibility for was lurking. Mettaton’s still watching him, and he catches Capra’s hand as he goes to mess with his scar again, this time holding it tightly. Capra never knows if he appreciates that gesture or hates it - hey, let him have his fucking thing, Mettaton did weird shit when he was stressed out too! - but then Mettaton wraps his free arm around his waist, inching closer to rest his head on Capra’s shoulder. He has a hard time being irritable when Threep does that. A comfortable - or less uncomfortable - silence falls over the room, until his husband speaks up again. 

“I can’t wait to meet her.” Mettaton says, and he knows, he _knows_ that isn’t a lie, he can see something eager dancing behind the mechanical lenses in his eyes when he cranes his neck to check. He’s excited. Obviously he’s excited, look at how fucking well he’s taking it! He’d plopped this on him out of nowhere, in the middle of the night, after a mini-tour that had gone two more nights than Threep had fucking _promised_...

Mettaton had been somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean when Molly had washed up on the beach - way too far, and way, way too unpredictably … uh, midair to ask you or Sans to try grabbing him mid-flight, even if you did have that kind of reach. He was never clear on how far the two of you could go with that. Still, no way to give the heads up. Mettaton was always exacting about checking his text messages the second the plane landed, though, so he knew this was coming before he’d gotten home, but… it had still been like 2 a.m. when Mettaton walked through the door. Capra didn’t know a ton about telling kids what to do, but he was pretty sure that letting a fourteen year old stay up til god-knows-when to meet her… brother-in-law? Probably not great guardianship. 

Besides, the kid was exhausted. She’d had a very long trip. He’d basically just pointed her to a shower while you swiped some of Dot’s clothes for her to wear - that kid had too many clothes, because she just had to be every damn size, didn’t she? Molly had been a little heartened by the wardrobe available to her, though, saying,

“She’s got good taste!”

He’d thought about laughing, about correcting her that Dot wore the same seven t-shirts and those dumb jean shorts and flip flops and a backwards baseball cap because she was being _ironic_ , that these extensive closets were a side effect of adoring Uncle Mettaton, but…

Well, that had got him back to thinking about the bomb he was dropping on his husband again. 

“We never wanted kids.” He says softly, not quite meeting Mettaton’s eyes. Mettaton pauses, then shakes his head. 

“We didn’t want… well. You know.” He knew what? What didn’t they want? Babies? To be tied down? To have to feel guilty when one or the other had to leave for a month? To have to find someone who would give them - THEM - a kid in the first place? To have to go through the heartache and the bullshit of hearing the rationales about why they - a human, a monster, and both male - just couldn’t be fit to be in charge of a kid?

And then, Capra thought blackly, maybe they weren’t wrong. Not about Threep, of course. Fuck no. That guy could do anything he set his mind to. But him? HIM? You couldn’t just put him in charge of a kid. What if he got distracted? What if he ran short on patience? What if he really, really, messed the kid up because he was a shitty dad because being a shitty dad was all he knew?

(He was wallowing, a little, in his own panic.) 

They just hadn’t really talked about it. They had deliberately _not_ talked about it, because there was something shitty there, maybe, him not wanting a kid. There was something shitty, because he sees the light in his husband’s eyes now and he wonders, just for a moment, if he’d been a terrible person, deliberately not talking about this. Well, not this-this, not a random teenager who shared a decent chunk of his DNA, but… oh, fuck it. Stop making such a fucking meal out of this worry, Peter. There had been plenty of kids around, after all. They did their share of parenting of Dot, Haruhi and Cody without the major responsibilities. It was like when your roommate had a cat; all the perks of pet ownership, none of the litterboxes. 

Mettaton’s still watching him. “This is different. This is… this is the _right thing._ ” He breathes, and Capra sighs, smiling at him at last. 

“It’s kinda what we do.” He yawns, and Mettaton chuckles, a little worried still as he watches Capra, even as he’s reaching for the light switch. 

“Damn straight.” The robot says, as the room goes dark. 

______________________________________________________

The next morning, it all feels a little unreal. 

The sun is shining in through big bay windows, forming a perfect spot for a disdainful and regal looking white tomcat to sprawl out, halfway across her chest in that semisolid state that she was learning even thoroughly non-magical cats could occupy. She blinks, rubbing her eye, then very cautiously wriggles out from underneath the animal. She hasn’t spent a ton of time around animals - pets were pretty _verboten_ in her house, and cats, welllllll cats were right out, thanks dad for making it clear that they were dumb animals for vapid women, et cetera, et cetera. 

She’s _glad_ there’s a cat, she thinks stubbornly. This is what she wanted. Hippie degenerates, just like he’d always said. Moms and dads sneaking drugs (well, pot, pot was legal here but it was still weird for like, parents) out on the beach at night, and moms and _moms_ , and her brother and THE Mettaton, and humans and monsters and… and skeletons and dogs and there was a cat here, and that was good. She just hopes he doesn’t decide to claw at her or something. He cracks two eyes - one blue, one orange - open, and she pauses, holding her breath. He deigns to glare at her for disturbing him, but then goes right back to bed, and she quickly wriggles out before he can do… she doesn’t know. Cat stuff. 

This was a lot.

Everything was so different here.

There hadn’t been monsters back home. Her dad had seen to that, that wherever the epicenter of monster activity was, that they’d be living in the exact opposite place, not that it had been hard to find an exact opposite. It had only been, what, fifteen or so years since the barrier had opened, there weren’t too many monsters in places that weren’t Ebott, and she couldn’t really fault them for not wanting to leave somewhere like this, especially when the rest of the world was so utterly balls, but holy cow-

No. 

Holy shit. She could say holy shit now. Peter had said it a bunch, so...

“Dot?” 

The voice is low enough and sudden enough and _loud_ enough to make her jump directly up in the air, and by the time she’s placed the source of the sound - the cracked door that’s slowly opening - it seems too late to say anything, not that there’s anything that really can be said to “Dot?” 

The voice is continuing, “What are you doing in here? If you’re switching rooms, I get to have your old one. Mom _promised._ ” The tone is petulant, which is weird, because it is coming from the most pants-shittingly-terrifying creature she’s ever laid eyes on. God, it’s - he’s? - seven, seven and a half feet tall, and such smooth, deadly bone, he makes her want to freeze like a rabbit that’s just spotted an eagle, and maybe she’s not far off, because behind that deadly, regal head, those sleek ivory horns, those are almost certainly wings folded up just a little awkwardly on his back, and even though it - he’s - inexplicably wearing floral swim trunks and a Gryffindor t-shirt - he’s the most terrifying thing she’s ever even been able to imagine. 

“Cool hair streak.” The terrifying thing says. 

“Um… thanks?” She squeaks, and the creature falls deadly still, just regarding her, his deep eye sockets flickering a deep, deep red, and then-

“Uh. Oh. Gosh. You’re not Dot.” He rumbles.

“Nope.” She whispers, and watches his ribcage inflate as he takes a breath, processing this.

“Hey, Codes, hang back for a bit, I just talked to mom, she says we’ve got company because apparently Pete’s dad didn’t realize he goofed up the first time around - or like, no, second thought, he probably saw Pete like minute one and realized, whoops, huge mistake, back to the drawing board, let’s try and make a normal - oh, jeez.” A much higher voice from a girl who sounds about her age has joined the mix, and Molly’s sluggish brain finally processes this. 

Codes. Cody. Dot and Cody. 

There’s a skeletal girl craning her neck around her brother’s arm now, trying to see through the doorway.

“Oh man I’m so sorryIthoughtshewasyou-” The creature - no, the person, the _Cody_ is saying in a rush, staring at his sister now. Dot gives him - was that a fucking eight year old, that massive monster, you’d said you had an eight year old son and oh GOD - okay okay okay okay okay. Breathe.

Her dad said monsters were degenerate animals, and her dad was an old racist jerkbag, so this had to be fine.

Dot gives Cody a spectacularly unimpressed look as Molly struggles to process all this, and then shifts neatly before Molly’s eyes into a human figure, a girl with brown eyes and brown hair and a very friendly smile, one that doesn’t exactly reach her eyes. Molly knows a fake smile when she sees one, and it would put her on edge if she weren’t already keyed up twenty degrees past on edge by the kid watching her.

“Sorry about that. He doesn’t know how to _knock._ ” Dot sighs dramatically, shouldering past her brother. “You’re Molly? I mean, I assume, or there’s another random human in our house-”

“I’m Molly.” She sputters, her face turning bright red. Dot regards her, smile still wide, eyes even warier. God, she just didn’t know what someone like Dot could even do! Could she hear her heart still stammering in her chest, smell that fear-sweat on her from whatever it was in her chest that screamed something was wrong, being this close to Cody-

“You good?” Dot asks, her glance darting from Molly to Cody. Her voice is friendly, but there’s something like steel underneath that light and pleasant tone.

“Yeah.” Molly replies, very, very quickly. Dot thinks on this, then grins. The smile almost reaches her eyes. 

“Brothers.” She pronounces. “Giant pains in the ass. You just fucking wait til’ you really have to deal with yours...”

She really, really gets to _swear,_ Molly thinks, managing to find time to be impressed even though... 

“You’re mean. Be nice to me. And to Molly.” Cody sighs, then jerks that big head up to really lock onto his sister, and because Molly is watching closely, she suddenly _gets it_ , she recognizes something, and her brain churns, lurches suddenly into overdrive, making a guess, a connection. She can’t help it. She gasps.

“Got a problem?” Dot says, pleasantly again but still so menacing, like someone who talked a lot about how glad they are that the thing they’d given you to drink isn’t poisoned. It’s uncanny, but Molly’s already blurting out;

“He MOVES wrong!” 

“... _What._ ” Dot’s voice is like ice now, but she can’t help it, she’s figured something out and so she just _has_ to explain, she has to because she was always so bad at keeping it in when she’d solved a puzzle-

“Cody, you move faster than it looks like you move? I mean! It’s not wrong or bad! It’s just that I don’t think my eyes can…” Her brow furrows, she’s thinking hard, and Dot tilts her head, studying Molly intently, the irritation in her expression fading.

“Oh, it’s so weird to see that look on someone’s face that isn’t Pete.” She muses. 

“Hah!” Cody booms out a laugh, then winces, “Sorry! Did I do it again, am I moving… um…” He trails off uncertainly.

“It’s like... “ She tries to think of how to put this. “I tried to learn claymation before, uh… mom…” She’s still not good at this part, and Dot’s opening her mouth to ask, so she just pushes on, “Anyway, I learned all about how cameras work, and how human eyes can only see so many frames per second, but because some monsters see faster, they’re putting in more frames but because humans are so used to watching things at 24 frames per second, films with more frames look weird and uh…” She trails off, suddenly feeling stupid. “That’s um… how you move, that’s kind of what it reminds me of, I tried to make a really really cool movie, 200 FPS! but it looked super bad and kind of um… unsettl-”

“Grampa says my atoms are always in quantum flux! That’s why I don’t show up in pictures good anymore!” Cody interrupts proudly, and Dot rolls her eyes. 

“Grandpa’s a weird jerk who shouldn’t have access to microscopes. Or to you. I don’t know what you get out of hanging out with Dry Bones.” She corrects her brother, then squints at Molly. “That’s… interesting, though. If that makes sense. I don’t know if it does, but... “

“People do look at me funny.” Cody slumps slightly, but then perks up. “It would be nice if it wasn’t just because I’m scary and I don’t have skin and stuff.” 

“Codes…” Dot begins, then looks back at Molly, still clearly thinking. “My eyes have um, always been… really good.” She downplays a little. “I suppose I don’t know what humans see, but… humans… and, yeah, some monsters… but… not all monsters have better eyesight than humans… huh.” She hesitates. “Huh.” She repeats, after a second. 

“I know it’s not a reason to look at you funny.” Molly scrambles quickly, as Cody raises a hand to peer at it. She’s not sure that he totally understands what she’s saying - he’s a kid, she reminds herself - but… “I also, um, got really into ghost hunting?”

“Of course you did. Molly Capra got into ghost hunting.” Dot mutters meaningfully, and Cody tears his eyes away from his skeletal talons to let out a very deep giggle. Molly ignores this, closing her eyes so she can actually get the thought out.

“Most haunted houses aren’t actually haunted. There’s this thing, it’s called um, infrasound?” She twists her hands together awkwardly. “It’s really low noise. Lower than humans can hear, but it causes vibrations, and people feel uneasy around it, because it’s the sound - well - they think it’s like what animals pick up on before an earthquake or a tsunami or whatever?”

“Ultrasound?” Dot seems genuinely interested. 

“Infrasound.” She can’t help herself. She peeks her eyes back open. “You don’t hear it, you don’t notice it, but it’s there. The scientific explanation for the sinking feeling in your stomach in some rooms, or when you always think you’re catching something out of the corner of your eye - it even shakes your eyeball-”

“So I’m this bad sound? And I’m a movie that’s too fast for you?” Cody sounds skeptical, and Molly shrinks in on herself. 

“I’m sorry.” She mutters, suddenly very conscious that she’s in pajamas, and worse, that they’re Dot’s pajamas. “I just kinda threw that at you out of nowhere. My principal told my um.. my dad, that I have poor impulse control. A bunch of times.” 

“Aww.” Cody rumbles sympathetically, at the same time Dot lets out a very sarcastic;

“Poor impulse control? _You???_ ” 

Molly shrinks further, taking a step back until her legs hit the side of the bed, and Cody shakes his head - it’s less unsettling, isn’t it, now that she’s got a hypothesis, watching him move - looking disappointed with his sister. 

“Be nice to her.” He orders Dot, then steps closer to Molly. “You said it wrong.”

“Um…” 

“You said ‘my principal.’ You meant your old principal, right? You just said it wrong.”

“I…” She hesitates. 

“You’re gonna stay with us.” Cody says reassuringly. “It’ll be okay.” There’s so much confidence in that deep voice, actually, that Molly even straightens up a little. She’s bolstered slightly by a tiny tap on the lower back; whirling around, she sees that the cat has woken up, and has just headbutted her, letting out a deep purr. 

“Well. Looks like Specter thinks so.” Dot laughs, picking up the cat. “He’s a good judge of character.”

“Not as good as Bracket.” Cody says slyly. “Dot? Dot? Can she meet Bracket?”

“...I think we’ll work our way up to Blasters.” Dot says, eying the still clearly anxious Molly. “But hey.” She pauses, then nods to herself. “You probably belong here. I mean, Pete manages to belong here, so… yep. You’re in.” She admits, then squints again, really looking at Molly. “But… why’d you run away? Is Pete’s dad - your dad - god, he must be super fucking old!” She points out, amused, then blinks. “Is he really that bad, that you had to run away?”

This girl is probably a year younger than her, and yet, as she settles to a seat on the edge of the unmade bed, and pats the spot next to her - a wordless request for Molly to sit, too - she’s suddenly aware that she’s in awe of this confident monster. Human. Something.

“He’s.. yeah, he’s old-”

“What about your mom?” Cody wants to know. Molly winces.

“Um. No mom… for a year or so now.” 

The room falls very still. 

“Was she sick?” Cody wants to know. “I know humans aren’t good at healing stuff without magic-”

“Codes!” Dot snaps, then looks at her apologetically, but she’s already giving the easiest answer. 

“Um. Yeah. She was pretty sick.” She mumbles. It’s not a lie. All those pills, pill bottles in every single room of the house - just not always from a doctor. By the end, never from a doctor. 

Dot’s watching her sharply, but she says nothing, just nods, and Molly suddenly, desperately(!) wants these kids to understand why she’s showed up on their doorstep and talked some random crap - shit, you could say ‘shit’ here - about ghosts and stop motion animation and infrasound and her stupid principal, and-

“My dad.” She pronounces very deliberately. “Is a fucking… enormous, gigantic, shitty… shit... asshole.” Her words practically ring with conviction. 

“...Damn.” Cody rumbles.

“Fuck.” Dot agrees, giving Molly a look of approval that suddenly, somehow, means more than anything.

She could belong here.

She didn’t know what it was like to belong anywhere.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really underestimated how many chapters I'd need to tell this story.  
> ...There's gonna be a part three.


	175. An Extremely Long Chapter That is Basically Just OCs Talking About Exposition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enjoy this bonus chapter as cha boy TST emerges from her den, squinting in the watery spring sunlight after several months of hibernation; her winter fat stores depleted, her breath terrible.

_Call your dad._

 

If the little voice in his head sounded like his husband, he thought, not for the first time, it was only because his goddamn Talkboy of a husband had been a broken record for half a year now. No, worse than that. Something way more annoying than a record.

 

A broken… parrot.

 

A broken Furby.

 

A broken see-and-say.

 

_“The cow says… ‘moo.’ The robot says… ‘call your dad.’”_

 

He should really call his dad.

 

It had started about a month post-Molly, this routine of absolute denial that he was now so comfortably settled into. It was easy to be in denial. It was easy to ignore that one glaring unchecked box on his to-do list, because things were going… like, really fucking good for once! He had this under control, this whole big brother thing. Molly was getting on great with the other kids, getting on great with everyone, really.

 

They were bonding, him and his sister. It was all actually going okay.

 

 She’d made him watch all of The Last Airbender, and she hadn’t joined in when Dot, Haruhi, and Sans had stared mocking him because he’d had to glance away from the screen when Iroh sang that fucking, that fucking song about the leaves - Molly hadn’t teased him because she’d also been looking away from the screen, biting her lip.

 

He’d showed her some stuff, too; he’d started with Buffy, and then the good seasons of Doctor Who, and then she’d surprised him with all these ancient D&D podcasts, and the more they shared the more he felt he might understand her. They were similarly bad about talking about anything important, much less something so awkward and uncomfortable as _feelings_ , so they got around all that by sharing with each other the things that were important to them. It wasn’t so awkward if someone else was saying it, even if that person was the Tenth Doctor or Magnus Burnsides.

 

It wasn’t just the movies and music and stuff that made him think that he might actually get her, though, it was… like,  everything. The way she freaked out when Sans offered to let her try some stuff out in his lab (something Dot had no interest in, and Cody politely declined), the way she’d sometimes just be sitting at the dinner table, silently observing Undyne talking about her greatest feats, or you talking about your work at the Parekh Center, or Cody grumbling at how bad flying lessons were going… he understood the look in her eyes. He’d been there, once, in this very house, staring at your parents all filled with wonder and processing that there were other people out there who were like him, who weren’t satisfied with the world being mundane and cruel.

 

He remembered the first time he’d realized just what she was realizing, that he _wasn_ _’t alone._

 

And it would go different this time. It wouldn’t be stolen away from her, this wouldn’t fracture the way it had back when he had those hungry, disbelieving eyes, back when you’d lost your parents and he’d buckled under those voices in his head that told him he would only make things worse by trying.

 

He could help. And he was helping, and he was keeping Molly safe, and between him and Mettaton (and you and Sans and Undyne and Alphys and Papyrus), he was even doing okay at the whole pseudo-parental guardian thing, even if he wasn’t like, exactly… a _legal_ guardian. _Call your dad, Cap._

 

Still, things were getting taken care of. Clothes were purchased, rooms were redecorated, a private cello instructor was found. After Molly spent hours in the rainforest room in the aquarium, fascinated by the slow-moving anaconda, she’d come home to find an terrarium with her very own ball python. She had a bike now, and a cellphone, and contact lenses.

 

Even the more legal-y things were working out. Thanks to that classic Capra charm, Molly had been registered at the local high school, even in spite of her mysterious lack of official paperwork. He hadn’t done magic of course. He wouldn’t have, not for anything not life-and-death important, really. He’d just smiled in his most handsome way at the vice principal, who was obviously susceptible to that sort of thing… and fine, maybe he’d even cockily arched an eyebrow, lazily shrugged at the boring, vice-principally questions he was getting asked. Maybe he’d reached for his pocket in that sort of “Okay, but I am very rich so, clearly, I don’t have time to worry about proper paperwork” way, the way that - granted - had gotten him out of a hell of a lot of paperwork.

 

It could have been that, his sheer handsomeness, his suave charm. Or… theoretically, possibly, it could have been the seven-figure donation he’d scribbled onto a check he’d pulled out of his pocket as he coughed up a Peter Capra Grant to go towards, as he’d written in the memo line, “Science, or like art I guess.”

 

Either way, Molly had been enrolled in school, and that should have meant that things were fine, but then his damn, perfect, beautiful… _shithead!_ of a spouse, the person he loved to the weird corners of the earth, had decided to start commenting, just before bed each night, “You know, you really should call your father about Molly.”

 

He was grumpy about the way Mettaton just kept on saying that, because the guy was, unfortunately, right. He should call his dad. He really should. He’d started out, back when Molly had only been with them for a month, promising that he would.

 

“Jesus Christ, Threep, I’ll get to it.” He would claim, and Mettaton would roll his eyes in that know-it-all way, but he wouldn’t say anything to Capra, wouldn’t challenge him, because they both knew the reason for the delay.

 

Peter Capra was scared shitless of his father.

 

What he and Molly understood about Francis Capra, what Mettaton could hear but couldn’t quite GET, when it came down to it, was that the old man did not get his kicks, usually, from yelling or hitting or throwing. What their dad did, what he _relished_ doing, was finding the thing you loved, the hope you kept buried in your chest, finding something genuinely precious to you, and then making you watch as he tore that precious thing to shreds. He would say something soft, something silken and eminently reasonable as he casually revealed his awareness of that defenseless little thing, and you were like the crowd at a zoo witnessing a toddler topple into a lion enclosure, knowing what would probably happen, utterly powerless to stop it, and still, goddamn, hoping in a way that you could taste in your throat that this would be the time it would shake out okay, that the lion wouldn’t strike, that rescue would come.

 

His father loved to keep people there, dangling, insisting all the while in that authoritative, disappointed tone that this was for their own good.

 

He had been armored, once. He had constructed an impenetrable shell, where the things he liked, even loved, were things that couldn’t be taken away or torn apart. Brains. Success. Being the cleverest. Back when that was all that mattered, he’d been protected, but now he lived in a house filled with soggy, emotional goobers who talked about love all the time, and… well, obviously, he wasn’t immune. It had taken no time at all, really, for his sister to become someone terribly important to him, to become someone he was desperate to keep safe. And, isn’t-it-fucking-ironic? Because he cared, he was putting her at risk.

 

If he called his father, then, he reasoned, his father would _know_. He would know that he had Peter Capra by the short and curlies (gross), that there was a thing that Peter Capra wanted desperately to protect, and he would find a foolproof way to destroy it, to tear it all down in slow motion so that his son could really have an opportunity to witness it all crumble. The old man was technically, legally, in charge of Molly until she was eighteen, and if he ever realized that yanking Molly home would be excruciating for his oldest AND youngest kid? He wouldn’t hesitate; he’d force her to come back and find a way to make sure she could never escape again. He had to convince his dad he didn’t care about his kid sister, because that was the only way to keep her safe.

 

Except.

 

Except, well, there was a limit. He knew he had to call his dad and say “Old man, when are you coming to pick up this shitty kid, she’s cramping my style” and then pray to God or Todd or whatever that his dad wouldn’t call his bluff, that the old fucker would try to make him miserable by saying “Molly’s your problem now.” Except. He could only procrastinate on that for so long, because there was a limited window, he figured, that he could pull that trick off before it stretched the outside borders of credulity. Nobody whose style was really getting cramped would put that call off.

 

Worse, he didn’t have a backup plan if he fucked up on that call. He’d learned this one the hard way when he’d been forced to let Sans test his magic (after he’d lost a dumb bet about Highlander.) Dennis, apparently, had been fucking great at commanding people to do things over the phone, or that’s what Sans said, anyway. Dennis had also had a lot longer to practice. Capra hadn’t been able to purposefully give an order that stuck if he was more than a few rooms away from the recipient, especially if he couldn’t see the person he was ordering around. Even if he decided that this was one of those vanishingly rare, “fuck it” occasions where he genuinely would have to give an order, he couldn’t do it on the phone with his father.

 

It was an excuse. A shitty one, but an excuse. There wasn’t a safety net. So, he procrastinated.

 

Months two and three, post-Molly, those rolled by so fast. Molly showed him ancient Smashmouth memes, he showed her his old Super Nintendo. Molly relaxed around Cody, so Dot relaxed around Molly, and suddenly Dot and Molly were inseparable. Cody and Haruhi obviously were in awe of Molly, who was older and novel and paid attention to them when Dot wouldn’t, even when they were being genuinely annoying. And you, you doted on her like she was your own, and he couldn’t blame you for it, because every once in a while he’d meet your eyes and you’d share a silent exchange, that you had to do this right, that this was _important_ , and then - fuck - where did all that time go? Three months. By the time they’d flashed by, he’d come up with an excuse that was at least decently convincing.

 

“Sweetheart.” Mettaton would beg. “Call your father. This isn’t tenable. It’s not fair to Molly.”

 

“Okay, but here’s the thing, and really hear me out… my dad is old as, like, Gandalf’s balls. No. Wait. What’s the guy in the Silmarillion who made the Valar and the Maiar, because my dad’s older than his balls, if that guy does in fact have balls, which we’ll never know because Tolkien was a GODDAMN COWARD-”

 

“Peter. Please be serious.” Shit. He could usually make Mettaton basically give up and leave if he got started on a rant about either Lord of the Rings or fictional genitals. This was bad.

 

“Well, fine, but he’s in his seventies or whatever. What if he’s just like, senile? What if he forgot that he even had another kid? He’s got like a bunch of kids, right, who cares if one goes missing? And! Plus! We only need to get through, what? Four more years until Molly’s a technical-actual-adult? Just saying, so far, so good.” He tried to sound convincing, even though he knew Mettaton wasn’t buying it. He wasn’t really trying to sell Mettaton on it anyway. He was trying to convince himself. It was almost working.

 

Except, well, Mettaton was his conscience sometimes. Mettaton was that shiny little Jiminy Cricket who popped up like an in-brain jack-in-the-box (fuck, now there was a terrifying mental image) and reminded him to make the bed, to offer to clean up after breakfast, to call _his fucking dad_ _…_

He didn’t, and time continued to pass at its normal rate, and his brilliant, anxious kid sister burrowed her way into a spot in his heart that he hadn’t known existed and set root.

It was six months post-Molly now. Half a fucking year since she’d crashed your and Sans’ little weed party, you degenerates, and Capra still refused to pick up the goddamn phone, even though… even though, fuck, he knew that if he was Molly, he’d be furious, because Peter Capra was a grownup with years more experience (with their dad, with life, _et cetera_ ), not to mention power, both financial, and, well… literal.  She was just a kid, and kids shouldn’t have to worry that their erstwhile guardians weren’t following through with the whole “let’s make sure nobody can take you away” thing.

 

She’s probably glaring at him right now.

 

He peeks open an eye, and looks at his kid sister, seated cross-legged on the lawn a few feet away from him. She is not glaring at him, but she _is_ poking a ladybug with a piece of grass, looking supremely, sublimely bored. He can’t help it; he snorts out a laugh, and she jerks her head up,  excuses already half-formed on her lips:

 

“Okay, Pete, but I’m still like enormously not getting it-”

 

“Well, you’re not going to get it if you’re fucking… fucking with ladybugs instead of trying!” He tries, pushing his hair back from his face. It’s finally warm enough to go outside again, and the two of them are seated in a shady spot on the front lawn, shielded from the sun by three bushes that Papyrus has fucking _meticulously_ trimmed to look like velociraptors for reasons that seem a lot like an inside joke. The velociraptors are not important right now, he’s supposed to be doing something, but wouldn’t you know it, neither member of the Capra family can really be quiet and focus up.

 

They’re here so he can try to give her magic lessons, but magic lessons are not going well for Molly. 

 

 

He’d figured out some _good_ new magic shit, almost… fuck, a decade ago? It had been for an obvious reason, really. He’d never had to worry about figuring out new stuff before because Capra was regularly in the process of… _borrowing_ magical energy from Mettaton. Via, like, Robot Dick Avenue or whatever. It was an elegant system, in that it worked out with them fucking a lot, which was kinda goals A, B, and C, as far as Capra was concerned. Also, fuck, when did he even use magic? Magic was… a byproduct. An _interesting_ byproduct (and one that confirmed that he was unique and special and the hero of the story), but still, not the end goal.

 

So it had been fine, FINE, until Mettaton had left for a nine-goddamn-month-German-experimental-bullshit-film shoot in rural-goddamn-Australia. He’d had feelings about that plan, since Australia was nothing but a prison colony masquerading as a continent that took an entire fucking weekend to even GET to-

 

 No. He hadn’t been mad at Australia, not really. Australia was important. It had given him Mad Max. He was just frustrated because he was desperately needed at EbbCo, and travel was so impractical that it had ended up being the longest that he’d ever been away from Mettaton.

 

It barely even registered that his source of magic was gone at first, because he spent a week or two trying to cope with his feelings by leaving his clothes everywhere and generally living the most exaggerated bachelor lifestyle he could - something he’d never really liked to do even back when he was a bachelor, but it looked interesting when people did it on TV. Unfortunately, it hadn’t held his attention, and soon he’d been occupied by sulking all the time and doing big dramatic sighs that had annoyed everyone except baby Cody. It was only after he moved past the dramatic sigh stage that he noticed his lack of magic was becoming an issue.

 

It turned out that he used magic, like, kind of a lot. It wasn’t because he was giving orders or anything like that. His ethical code even at that point was basically “I will only use the power to command only in the direst of situations, unless a) I lose a bet to Sans and I have to do his experiments or b) anyone starts shit with Mettaton.”

 

Still, it turned out that a lot of the things he was used to getting away with were at least, er, _enhanced_ by his magic. His ability to read a room? That burned magic. Witty and well-received quips? Goddamn, if those didn’t burn magic, which was mildly insulting. Worse still, lying in a convincing way, especially before various panels of stonefaced government agents who all wanted to know what exactly the military applications of monsters and/or magic might be… oh, buddy, did that ever burn up his reserves. Two months in, and he’d been running on fumes, and everybody in the house could tell.

 

“Uh, you could probably have some of mine?” You’d offered, which had made Sans arch a browbone. “I mean, we did it before? Or… er. Is that weird if it’s not an emergency? I feel like it’s weird.”

 

“it’s weird.” Sans confirmed. “’s like you offering him a stick of gum and then giving him one you’d already chewed. gross. except, heh, it’s less gum and more cu-”

 

“Do not finish that joke while you’re holding our infant son who is _actively learning and repeating words right now_.” You’d hissed, and Sans had ducked, a guilty grin on his smug face. Well, fine. Whatever. He didn’t need your or Sans’ stupid… _gum_. “Cap, just tell me if you need my help, okay?” You’d insisted, but he’d shrugged.

 

“I’m good. I’ll just live like a normal human for a while, I guess.”  Ugh, he hoped he didn’t start aging. He was so looking forward to you and Sans looking older than him, and he didn’t want anything to slow that process down.

 

He’d been slouching in the recliner in the living room in the middle of the night, watching TV and definitely not pouting after Mettaton had (very apologetically) hung up on their only call that week. He’d closed his eyes, for just a second, feeling tired and lonely and _missing_ his husband, and –

 

_Oh._

 

\-  then he’d been able to see it. A picture had materialized in his head, a matrix of thin glowing lines, the color the barrier had been, the color of pure magic… and the brightest of these lines, the only one that mattered, was the thread stretching halfway around the world. It had come to him just like it had in the cave under Mt. Ebott, when it had seemed like all hope was lost. He _felt_ his connection to Mettaton, and then the magic was all through him. It was weaker than it had been in the cave, and it was harder to locate - he flinched, startled, and the threads flickered out of his mind, and it took him three more hours of concentration before they finally popped up again, and he could once more feel the sparking energy of the bond between his soul and Mettaton’s… and then he could feel another bond lancing into his soul, then another, and another, and as he tried to ground himself, to gather all this beautiful, incredible magic - this goopy ass love shit that was always magic, that always surrounded him, even though he never fucking noticed unless he was really deliberately trying…

 

Something inside him that wasn’t really a thing at all had suddenly flared back into life. He lost the connection again, but it was okay now. He’d found it before, and he’d be able to get it back. Better still: He’d figured out something new.

 

He’d always been interested in alternative energy.

 

When you’d seen him the next morning, all bright and chipper and chock-full-o’-magic, with a husband still a hemisphere away, you’d immediately snarled,

 

“Oh, you _motherfucker_ , I swear to fucking god I will kill you where you stand and-I-will-tell-Mettaton-damnit-Cap-youcouldn’tkeepitinyourpantsforaFEWMOREMONTHS- I AM TELLING METTATON-” your voice getting faster and higher and louder as you exploded at him.

 

He’d had to try very hard not to say something hilarious that would definitely get him in deeper trouble, and then had scrambled for anything else to say, and had finally managed, “Relax, my dry spell remains… you know, uh, dry…” Sans was still taunting him about that literal years later.

 

(He wanted to be mad that you’d assumed that he’d cheat on Mettaton, but in the end he was too pleased with how instantly you’d sprung to Mettaton’s defense. Fuck, did living in this house do a number on people.)

 

—————————————————————————————————

 

The decision to teach Molly magic had been made much more recently. Well, like, yeah, obviously, she’d only been here for half a year ( _call your fucking dad, Capra_ ), it would have to be recent, but this was like, two weeks recent, after two months of debate. Molly’s soul, so everyone kept telling him, looked just like his. He wouldn’t know, he couldn’t see the damn things unless they were literally dragged out into the open and put on display, and even then…

 

“thing is, cap, we kinda lucked out with you. you had all this power you didn’t know you even had, and you managed to not destroy the world or start a cult or whatever. i mean, ace work, bud. but like, we saw how it worked out with dennis…” Sans had reasoned.

 

“Hey, fuck you, Molly’s nothing like Dennis!” He’d reacted, a little startled by the comparison… and immediately defensive. Sans had eyed him, then given him one of those opaque, smug smiles that meant Sans thought something was kind of funny but didn’t want to tell anyone what it was.

 

“sure. just sayin’. kid needs to know what’s up so she doesn’t accidentally convince someone to do something bad, you know?” Capra hesitated. He did know, but-

 

“She’s a kid still! She doesn’t have to worry about that shit yet? Right?” Give her a few more years, he silently bargained, raising his eyebrows and hoping Sans would see the light. His type of power wasn’t an easy one to have, not if you were trying to be a good person. He’d understood that instinctively, the split second he’d figured out his ability all those years ago. This gift, it wasn’t just the ability to tell people what to do, it was the power to do away with consequences. It was the ultimate cheat code. The problem was, of course, that once you played with the cheat code on, going back to the everyday struggle of figuring out how to do things without it was hard. And, well, he’d played The Sims before, he knew that unfettered power generally led to a lot of people drowning in swimming pools.  He knew that.

 

But all that moralizing was hard to keep in mind when you saw something shitty but not egregious, something you could easily stop. A guy yanking his tiny puppy’s leash until the poor thing yelped. A guy in a sportscar on a cellphone parking across three handicapped spots, no permit in sight. It would be so easy to fix these little injustices. So easy to give himself the permission to make the world the Peter Capra version of better. Where did he draw the line? When was he required to step in, because not doing so would be way worse?

 

He wanted to give Molly a few more years before she had to feel that weight around her shoulders. Hell, maybe she’d go her whole life unburdened. No guarantee she’d even have to worry about magic. She might meet an average human, or like, nobody at all! Not that he wanted to ever think about how Molly might stumble across magic, chrrrist, but still.. She might have a normal life, never have to feel that gift flare to life and know the responsibility it entailed, right?

 

“she’s not a kid, cap. she’s fourteen. she’ll be grown and making her own decisions before we know it.” Sans said, but gently, kindly, in that fucking “I’m a dad so I understand how things are” voice that drove him nuts. “you gotta let her figure it out now, so she’ll be safe, so she won’t hurt anyone or get hurt later. teach her that weird meditation shit you do, get her working with ambient magic now, that bond stuff you do, and make sure she understands exactly what can go wrong. look, she’s way too much like you for me to think she won’t figure out some brilliant way to get her hands on some magic that we haven’t even anticipated. crawl into the middle of the core or something.”

 

“She wouldn’t.” He had argued halfheartedly. “Too risky.”

 

“you _stuck your fucking hand in the barrier on a hunch._ ” Sans reminded him. “and you were older than her. she’s smart, pete, she’ll figure something out-”

 

“I just want to keep her safe…” He had sighed, then grimaced. “Fuck, listen to me! I sound like… well, not my dad, but somebody’s dad! Like a sitcom dad or something!” He’d exclaimed.

 

_(Call your dad, Capra.)_

 

At that moment, Cody had strolled in, all elegant predatory grace - except for the bony clatter of wings that were slightly too big for him still, or the fact that he was unsuccessfully trying to play “Hot Cross Buns” on a plastic recorder. Once the cacophony ended - not with a flourish so much as the sound a recorder might make if it was forced to watch its recorder wife cheat on it with its recorder best friend - Cody glanced up at his dad and Capra like he was just now noticing them. He studied them with deep, inscrutable eyes, and then addressed Capra directly.

 

“You should teach Molly how to use magic now.” He said with a shrug, then transitioned into something that was almost entirely not the tune to Jingle Bells.

 

That had settled it for Capra, because, goddamn it, he trusted Cody. He had reason to. He was almost certain that he knew what Cody’s magic was, though he wasn’t sure anyone else in the house had caught on yet, besides maybe Dot. He hoped Cody would tell everyone soon, because once he’d figured it out… god, it was just too good. The day he’d put the pieces together, he’d actually written an email to himself outlining his exact theory of what Cody was doing, and sent it with the intention of producing it whenever everyone else knew about Cody’s magic. He figured he could really rub it in Sans’ face, that he had known first. But, well… the next morning, a sleepy Cody had glanced at Capra’s cell phone, then made eye contact with him, and muttered “Bad idea, Pete.”

 

Fine. He’d deleted the email. Nobody liked a gloater, he supposed. But the whole thing had solidified his opinion, so… if Cody was saying to try to teach Molly magic now, damn it, he’d try.

 

—————————————————————————————————

 

And he was trying, but it wasn’t working, because well, fuck, how could you explain to your kid sister how to close her eyes and visualize the bonds of love connecting everyone when you were Peter Fucking Capra and saying that sentence out loud, about the love and the connection, might actually cause your skeleton to leave your body and start a new life somewhere less embarrassing? He changes gears. “Okay, quit it with the meditation. Let’s talk ethics.”

 

“I always forgot that you’re actually really old and probably knew Aristotle and Plato and think that philosophy is interesting-” Molly begins, smirking, and he rolls his eyes.

 

“Someday you’ll be as pretty as me, and all this jealousy will wash over.” He informs her seriously. “No, but c’mon, STEM-lord. I only keep telling you this because it’s, uhhhhhh, _like super fucking important_. Once you have your power, you’ll _have_ it, and you’ll need to decide what that means-”

 

“It doesn’t matter.” She says with a shrug. “I decided I’m not ever going to use it. The command thing, anyway. I could probably handle the bit where people think I’m more charming than I actually am-” She drawls pointedly, raising an eyebrow, ”since it seems so fun for you, but… I just feel too weird about making anyone do anything.”

 

“I mean… theoretically, that’s an option.” He says slowly, and she scowls at him.

 

“What, you don’t think I can handle myself? You told me what Dennis did, and I think it’ll be pretty easy to be the opposite of him if I just _don_ _’t_.” She says firmly, absolutely confident that her black and white understanding of the world is correct. He shrugs, then tells her the truth.

 

“I mean. I said I wouldn’t use it too, but I made it like two weeks.” Molly blinks at that, surprised.

 

“But you like… _never_ make anyone do anything!” She says, mildly scandalized, then hesitates. “Right?!”

 

“Uh, yeah, basically, _World_ _’s Greatest Detective Angus McDonald_.” He teases her, and she laughs, looking extra pleased because she’d taught him that reference. “Don’t go conspiracy theory on me.” He instructs, then shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t know if I’d do it the same way again, but I was just learning what I could do back then, and I hadn’t put really any thought into it. Just figured I wouldn’t do it. But when a pack of shitty humans tried to harass Mettaton while he was singing karaoke-” She gasps, a little, at that. She can’t picture a world where anyone would dare harass _Mettaton_ , he thinks, which is kind of nice.

 

“What did you tell them to do?” She asks, after a moment.

 

“I mean, I didn’t have a plan. I um… look, I promise this sounded way more badass when I did it, but I basically told them to go home and think about what they’d done.” She giggles at that, and then her eyes widen as she thinks harder about it.

 

“Like… you made them feel bad? You forced them to get it?” She says, her tone unreadable. “Like… holy shit, imagine you’ve been a terrible person your whole life and then out of nowhere you suddenly understand how much you have to be ashamed of… that must feel-”

 

“Probably not great.” He says, feeling a little uncomfortable with the intensity of her regard, for just a second. Her eyes are hungry again, and he thinks about being fourteen, about having the power to force people to feel every bit of the pain they’d inflicted on you… He has to be careful, but he has to be honest. “It was probably super fucking bad, actually, but it’s not like I followed them back and checked up on them to see how they were doing. I snapped, and I said the first thing that came to my head that would make them stop hurting Mettaton-”

 

“Twoo wuv.”

 

“Shut it, you.” He grumbles as she makes goo-goo eyes at him. “So, yeah. I made mean people stop berating my boyfriend, and now some nights I have a hard time sleeping, not knowing what I did to their heads, or if they’re okay, or if they weren’t even evil, if they were normal people under Dennis’ influence who never had a choice in any of it.” He hasn’t ever expressed that thought out loud before, not even to Mettaton. He’d been planning on keeping that one tucked away forever, but she has to get it, she has to know all the ways it could go wrong. She’s looking distant now, less hungry, thinking. “Anyway. That’s what I’m saying. Our actions have really serious consequences, kid. I believe it was my old, elderly uncle who once told me that with great power comes-”

 

“Donnnnnnn’t.” She groans, knowing where this is going.

 

“Great responsibility.” He finishes over her protest, then grins, “Hey, how many times you figure you’ve seen Uncle Ben die on screen by now? Like… like fifteen, maybe? Like fifteen different Uncle Bens dying? That’s so weird, right? It’s like this ritual where every few years, we as a society decide we need to sacrifice another Ben so we can learn about heroes. Throw another Ben on the fire.”

 

“Pete.”

 

“It’s not like there’s not more in the wings! It’s not like it’s a hard acting job! Be an old man, then die!”

 

“I’m going to go back to trying to meditate now.”

 

“Well I’m going to think about Uncle Ben some more.” He says, amused, then adds, “And Spidey. And Doc Ock.”

 

“Mhm.” She’s already closed her eyes, and she’s trying to find her focus. He doesn’t distract her. He just waits, wishing he could find half as much to say about what as he was supposed to be teaching her as he could about Uncle Ben.

 

“I’m sorry, kid.” He sighs, when Molly lets out a soft whine of frustration after fifteen minutes of trying to visualize something he could barely understand. “I think I tried to cram in too much today, this one’s my fault-”

 

“No! I’m just frustrated with me!” Molly responds instantly, her eyes snapping open all big and blue and once again filled with hunger. She doesn’t want the magic power, she keeps insisting that, but she wants to _understand_ , and to be _special_ , and he’s been right there with her. He’d, as Sans had so kindly pointed out, stuck his hand in the goddamn barrier to confirm this hypothesis. They’d both spent their formative years hearing how worthless they were, and now that she was out of that sphere of influence, she needed something tangible to prove it. “If I could just…” She screws her eyes shut again, brow furrowing, one arm reaching out.

 

“Go easy on yourself. What you’re trying to do tough and totally new, and I can’t give you any more than half-assed Obi Wan lines. ” He insists. “C’mon, quitting time. You’ve gotta be in the right place to begin with. You’ll never find it if you’re frustrated, that’s not the right headspace. I don’t know. This sucks, not being able to help you do it. I hate unquantifiable shit.”

 

“Right?” Molly says urgently. “Like… there’s got to be a way to break down what’s happening when you tap into your threads or whatever, we just don’t have a huge part of the vocabulary we need to even start quantifying the unquantifiable shit, and we can’t begin to develop a vocabulary, or metrics or whatever, and it’s basically stuck as an unverifiable phenomenon at _least_ until I can figure it out the first time… I mean, I know _you_ can do it, Pete, I’m just saying, it wouldn’t pass peer review. Maybe if we could just…”

 

He is astonishingly fond of this kid, he muses, not for the first time, as Molly tries some theories out loud. These days, when he closes his eyes and finds those golden threads that tether themselves to his soul, Molly’s is one of the easiest to find. Well, it goes like this. Mettaton, then the intern who brings him coffee on hangover days, then Molly, and at the very bottom is Sans.

 

Okay, fine. He can admit it in his head. He finds Mettaton first, and then the rest of his family flickers in, all at once, Sans included. It had been gradual, but not as gradual as he’d feared, that he’d recognized that bond stretching out to his sister, tentative and wavering, but bright. He doesn’t touch it, because he thinks that’s probably unfair, poking that bond for insight on how Molly felt about him. That’s one of those things they don’t talk about, that she is someone precious to him, that she is family, that she is loved. He looks at Molly, who is still chattering to talk herself out of being defeated by a Thing She Is Not Great At, and decides she needs a break.

 

“Hey.” He interjects. “Seriously. Quitting time. Let’s take a break for the night and go grab some dinner. Let’s see who else wants to come, and go someplace fun, huh?” Molly hesitates, then asks, a little too quietly,

 

“Um. Can we go to that hibachi chain downtown, next to the movies? I know it’s kind of expensive, but I, like, I actually clipped a coupon or whatever-”

 

He blinks at her. “Kid, wherever you want to go. I’ve got you, don’t, jesus, don’t goddamn worry about coupons…” She brightens up a little, and when he sees that, he feels that dumb, good feeling, for just a second, like he’s a fucking awesome brother, and then she explains, looking guilty-

 

“Mom used to always take me to the one back home on my birthday, even when it got… you know, bad at the end, for her. She’d pull it together for one day out of the year and we’d try to catch shrimp in our mouths and freak out at the onion volcano, so even though she’s gone now, it’s just kinda like… I feel almost like it’s cheating if I don’t do it, you know? I know.” Molly’s studying him closely, so she notices his wince, and she blushes. “It’s really, really stupid-”

 

“Is it your fucking birthday, Molly?” He stutters, and now she really turns red, the grass beneath her suddenly very interesting.

 

“It’s NOT a big deal.”

 

“What? Holy fuck, of course it is!” He says, almost indignant. She’d been here long enough that she knew how birthdays got here, big and loud and fully overdone! How could she think this didn’t apply to her?

 

“Birthdays mostly suck anyway.” She deflects, which sounds familiar - it’s one of his lines, but goddamn it. Goddamn it. He would have known this, he would have been prepared, if he’d gotten the _goddamn legal paperwork_ , which he could maybe have gotten if he’d found his spine and called his _goddamn_ _dad_ _…_

_“_ This one is not going to suck.” He says, and he means it.


End file.
